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A  Study  of  William  Shenstone 
and  of  His  Critics 

with 

Fifteen  of  His  UnpubKshed  Poems 

and 

Five  of  His  Unpublished 

Latin  Inscriptions 


A  THESIS 

PRESENTED  TO  THE  FACULTY  OF  WELLESLEY  COLLEGE 

BY 

ALICE  I.  HAZELTINE 

B.A.  WELLESLEY  COLLEGE,  1900 

IN  PARTIAL  FULFILMENT  OF  THE  REQUIREMENTS 

FOR  THE  DEGREE  OF 

MASTER  OF  ARTS 

JUNE,  1913. 


George  Banta  Publishing  Company 

Menasha,  Wisconsin 
1918 


\"  „'  "  /.  :     •  :;-  '''  i'j  i.  i 


.•.Sen*  »  t  i        A„  a 


COPYRIGHT,  I918 

BY  WELLESLEY  COLLEGE 

WELLESLEY,    MASS. 


1    >■.     ;     I     -    ■         1    .  .      •>  . 

».        i       i        «       ^  ^  t      -      <  V  «     t.  <      '    ,  * 


1^ 


I 

3 


CONTENTS  PAGE 

The  Manuscript 1 

LiPE  OF  William  Shenstone 5 

Periods  op  Interest  in  Shenstone 7 

Critical  Estimate 11 

1.  Introduction 11 

2.  Character 13 

v"                     3.  Landscape  Gardening 29 

4.  Poetry S3 

5.  Essays 47 

6.  Letters 50 

7.  Literary  Criticism 54 

8.  Conclusion 63 

Poems  and  Inscriptions  prom  the  Manuscript 64 

Table  op  Contents  op  the  Manuscript 87 

Bibliography 89 


216758 


To  Professor  George  Herbert  Palmer  of  Harvard 
University,  who  made  this  work  a  pleasure  by  lend- 
ing his  manuscript,  who  brought  it  into  being  by  his 
wish,  and  who  inspired  it  by  his  fine  sense  of  justice 
to  the  lesser  authors  of  our  literature,  I  give  sincere 
thanks.  It  is  a  pleasure  also  to  express  my  apprecia- 
tion and  gratitude  to  Professor  Margaret  Sherwood 
for  happy  hours  of  free  discussion  and  inspiring 
encouragement. 


CHAPTER  I 
The  Manuscript 

The  manuscript  that  has  occasioned  this  thesis  is  an  attractive 
little  gilt-edged  book  of  about  fifty  pages,  written  in  the  hand 
of  the  author,  William  Shenstone,  as  is  evident  from  comparison 
with  the  facsimile  letter  inserted  in  the  Works.  It  is  enriched 
with  many  half-page  or  full-page  water-color  paintings,  which 
are  almost  certainly  by  the  same  hand,  as  we  know  from  the 
Letters  that  Shenstone  amused  himself  with  such  work  (Works, 
III,  pp.  150,  155).  There  are  pictures  of  groves,  winding  streams 
and  walks,  cascades,  lakes,  summer-houses,  the  vistas  of  the 
blue  hills  and  of  the  church  spire  that  he  liked  so  well  to  look 
upon,  and  one  that  probably  shows  the  "ruinated  priory."  Be- 
sides, there  are  flowers,  emblematic  pieces  such  as  he  often  men- 
tions in  his  letters,  the  pheasant,  the  king-fisher  or  halcyon,  which 
he  chose  and  designed  for  his  coat  of  arms  (Percy-Shenstone,  p. 
19)t,  a  picture  of  the  urn  to  Thomson,  and  one  of  that  to  Eutrecia 
Smith.  All  are  done  with  the  same  careful,  almost  affectionate, 
attention  to  finish  of  detail  as  is  his  literary  work  and  even  his 
penmanship. 

The  manuscript  contains  forty-seven  poems  and  several  Latin 
inscriptions.  Of  the  poems,  fifteen  have  not  been  published; 
others,  somewhat  changed,  are  in  the  Works.  None  of  his  Levities 
or  his  Moral  Pieces  are  among  them,  nor  is  the  fourth  part  of  the 
Pastoral  Ballad.  We  find  the  other  three  parts,  however,  as  well 
as  the  Ode  to  Memory,  The  Dying  Kid,  and  Princess  Elizabeth. 
The  changes  in  the  poems  that  have  been  published  are  chiefly 
differences  in  phrasing.  Often,  perhaps  usually,  these  are  im- 
provements; for  example,  in  the  stanza: 

The  linnets  all  flock  to  my  groves; 
The  limes  their  rich  fragrance  bestow; 

And  the  nightingales  warble  their  loves 
From  thickets  of  roses  that  blow. 

t Thomas   Percy   and   William   Shenstone:   Ein   Briefwechsel   etc.       See 
bibhography. 


2  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

It  was  changed  thus: 

From  the  plains,  from  the  woodlands  and  groves 

What  strains  of  wild  melody  flow! 
How  the  nightingales  warble  their  loves 
From  thickets  of  roses  that  blow! 

{Works,  I,  p.  192) 

Sometimes,  on  the  other  hand,   the  change,  whether  made  by 

author   or   by   publisher,   was   unfortunate.     The   most   marked 

case  is  that  of  the  one  line  faulty  in  metre  in  Hope  of  the  Pastoral 

Ballad  as  pubhshed: 

But  a  sweet-briar  entwines  it  around. 

In  the  manuscript  it  is  faultless: 

But  a  jessamine  twines  it  around. 

The  fastidious  Shenstone  would  never  have  rested  content  with 

the  former,  which  must  have  been  the  choice  of  his  publisher, 

Dodsley,  of  less  exacting  ear  for  numbers  {Works,  III,  p.  340). 

There  are  some  changes,  also,  in  titles  and  in  number  of  stan- 
zas. The  poem  printed  as  Jemmy  Dawson  is  in  the  manuscript 
called  James  Dawson's  Garland;  The  Dying  Kid  is  The  Kid;  the 
Pastoral  Ballad  is  The  Shepherd's  Garland.  The  inscription  to 
Thomson  is  unlike  that  published  with  the  others  in  Dodsley 's 
Description  of  the  Leasowes  {Works,  II),  but  is  like  one  form  sug- 
gested by  Shenstone  in  a  letter  to  his  friend  Graves  {Works,  III, 
p.  134).  The  widely  admired  lines  {Burford  Papers,  English 
Romanticism  of  the  Eighteenth  Century)  inscribed  in  his  grounds 
to  his  favorite  cousin,  Maria  Dolman  (Works,  II,  p.  356),  are  here 
inscribed  to  Eutrecia  Smith.  The  few  poems  that  have  more 
stanzas  in  the  manuscript  I  give  in  full  in  another  section.  There 
are  several  that  have  fewer  stanzas;  for  example,  the  Ode  to  Mem- 
ory; the  poem  to  Lady  Luxborough,  Winter,  1747;  and  Fairy  Spell, 
which  in  the  manuscript  is  signed  "Oberon."  The  Verses  about 
Thomson  written  towards  the  close  of  the  year  1748  have  ten 
additional  stanzas. 

The  Scholar's  Relapse  has  this  note  at  the  foot  of  the  page: 
"Set  by  Howard  and  printed  vilely  in  his  British  Orpheus.  "  The 
Rose-bud  has  this:  "Set  by  Galliard. "  Thus  we  have  another 
ray  of  light  on  the  musical  setting  of  the  songs.  Arne's  melody 
for  the  Pastoral  Ballad  is  printed  in  Dodsley's  Collection  of  Poems 
by  Several  Hands. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  3 

The  unpublished  poems  make  no  new  revelation  of  the  nature 
or  the  art  of  Shenstone,  nor  do  they  equal  the  few  best  of  his 
already  known;  but  they  are  of  great  interest  in  confirming  our 
opinion  of  him  as  man  and  as  poet. 

Professor  George  Herbert  Palmer  of  Harvard  University  is 
the  present  owner  of  the  manuscript.  He  bought  it,  with  broken 
binding,  from  Bernard  Quaritch  and  had  it  rebound.  Quaritch 
had  bought  it  at  a  London  auction.  The  date  and  original  owner 
are  made  plain  by  the  inscription,  in  the  author's  hand,  inside  the 

front  cover: 

Given  to  Mary  Cutler,  Jan.  1,  1754 

by  Will :  Shenstone. 
In  Amore  haec  insunt  omnia.  Teren: 
Of  this  Mary  Cutler  we  learn  more  from  DTsraeh,  who  states 
on  the  authority  of  "the  late  Mr.  Bindley's  collection"  of  anec- 
dotes that  there  is,  on  the  back  of  a  picture  of  Shenstone  himself, 
of  which  Dodsley  published  a  print  in  1780,  the  following  inscrip- 
tion written  by  the  poet: 

This  picture  belongs  to  Mary  Cutler,  given  her  by  her  master,  William 
Shenstone,  January  1st,  1754,  in  acknowledgement  of  her  native  genius,  her 
magnanimity,  her  tenderness,  and  her  fidelity. 

W.  S. 

Thus  the  same  New  Year's  Day  brought  her  both  picture  and 
manuscript.  One  naturally  conjectures  that  Mary  Cutler  was 
his  housekeeper,  successor  of  good  Mrs.  Arnold,  and  the  one  who 
made  agreeable  the  occasional  half-hours  when  he  sat  in  his  kitchen, 
impelled  to  it  in  his  isolation  "by  the  social  passion,"  as  he  writes 
to  a  friend  in  the  early  part  of  his  life  at  the  Leasowes  (Burford 
Papers,  p.  188).  Perhaps,  too,  she  was  the  servant  to  whom  he 
left  an  annuity  of  thirty  pounds.  Of  the  other  owners  of  the  little 
volume  we  have  no  positive  knowledge,  but  I  have  found  one  or 
two  traces.  In  the  Gentleman's  Magazine  of  February,  1797,  is  a 
note  from  "D.  S.  P."  giving  a  Latin  inscription  to  "M.  A.,"  which 
he  says  he  copied  from  "a  small  manuscript  book  of  poems,  etc., 
written  by  the  late  Mr.  Shenstone  of  the  Leasowes,  most  of  which 
have  never  been  published."  He  thinks  the  lines  are  certainly 
intended  for  the  old  housekeeper,  Mrs.  Arnold.  This  inscription 
is  identical,  with  the  exception  of  dilaceratas  for  dilaceras,  with  that 
in  our  manuscript  for  "M.  A.,"  and  is  not  in  the  Works.     Thus 


4  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

it  seems  clear  proof  of  the  whereabouts  of  the  manuscript  in  1797. 
Quite  possibly,  also,  the  volume  was  in  1862  in  the  possession  of 
E.  Jesse,  who  writes  under  that  date,  "A  kind  friend  has  recently 
presented  to  me  a  box  full  of  unpublished  letters  and  manuscripts 
and  some  poems  of  the  poet  [Shenstone]  which  have  never  seen 
the  light,  together  with  some  views  of  the  Leasowes  and  sketches 
of  the  various  objects  which  he  placed  in  it,  all  drawn  by  the 
author's  hand "  {Once  a  Week,  VI).  Through  what  other  hands 
the  httle  book  has  passed  we  cannot  even  conjecture,  but  it  has 
been  well  kept.  Its  fair  pages  are  intact  and  are  fresh,  save  for  a 
little  yellowing  due  to  age  and  to  the  paints  used,  and  are  a  source 
of  pleasure  even  to  one  not  versed  in  the  lore  of  manuscripts. 


CHAPTER  II 
Life  of  William  Shenstone 

William  Shenstone  is  closely  associated  with  the  neat  town  of 
Hales-Owen  in  an  outlying  part  of  Shropshire,  about  seven  miles 
from  Birmingham.  There  he  was  born  (November  13,  1714); 
there  he  lived  quietly,  with  only  his  servants,  most  of  his  forty- 
eight  years,  writing  poetry,  essays,  letters,  and  inscriptions,  making 
his  native  fields  a  place  of  beauty  for  himself  and  his  many  guests; 
there  he  died  quietly  (February  11,  1763);  and  there  he  is  buried 
near  the  church  with  its  beautiful  spire. 

His  parents,  Thomas  Shenstone  and  Anne  Penn,  died  in  his 
boyhood,  and  he  was  left  under  the  kind  guardianship  of  an  uncle, 
Mr.  Dolman,  rector  of  Broome.  As  a  child  he  was  hardly  contented 
to  go  to  bed  without  a  book  under  his  pillow  as  a  companion. 
His  educational  advantages  included  the  dame-school,  the  Hales- 
Owen  grammar  school,  the  school  for  sons  of  gentlemen  and  nobles 
kept  by  Mr.  Crumpton  of  Solihull,  and  Pembroke  College,  Oxford. 
Of  Sarah  Lloyd,  the  "old  school-dame"  from  whom  he  learned 
to  read,  he  cherished  most  pleasant  recollections,  and  he  sketched 
her  portrait  affectionately  in  The  Schoolmistress.  At  Oxford  he 
spent  two  happy  years,  interested  and  successful  in  his  studies; 
associating  now  with  the  club  of  jolly  young  fellows  who  drank 
ale,  smoked,  and  sang  gay  songs  the  whole  evening,  now  with  the 
set  of  gentlemen  commoners,  superior  on  account  of  their  better 
liquor  (port  wine),  and  now  with  the  flying  squadron  of  plain, 
sensible,  most  rational  men  confined  to  no  club  (Graves:  Recol- 
lections, pp.  14-18).  He  formed  a  triumvirate  of  intimate  friend- 
ship with  Graves  and  Whistler,  which  was  broken  only  by  death. 
All  the  time  he  cherished  the  idea  of  taking  his  degrees  and  going 
on  to  the  study  of  physic.  No  doubt  he  surprised  himself  as  well 
as  his  friends,  when,  on  going  to  take  possession  of  the  Leasowes 
and  part  of  the  Harborough  estate  at  his  majority,  he  over-stayed 
the  vacation,  constantly  deferred  his  return,  and,  charmed  with 


6  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

the  peaceful  leisure  and  beauty  of  the  place,  never  went  back  to 
his  university  studies.  "In  this  decision,"  writes  Graves,  "the 
happiness  of  Mr.  Shenstone  was  materially  concerned.  Whether 
he  determined  wisely  or  not,  people  of  taste  and  people  of  worldly 
prudence  will  probably  be  of  very  different  opinions"  (Recollec- 
tions, p.  35). 

For  a  few  years  he  made  and  enjoyed  occasional  visits  to  Lon- 
don, to  the  literary  circle  at  Bath,  and  elsewhere;  but  after  that 
he  chose  to  stay  on  his  own  little  estate,  the  Leasowes,  making 
visits  a  few  miles  distant  now  and  then  and  one  long  journey  of 
seventy  miles  to  see  his  friend  Whistler.  Ten  years  before  his 
own  death  he  lost  his  only  near  relative,  his  brother  Joseph  of 
Bridgenorth,  to  whom  he  was  deeply  attached.  Thus  he  was 
left  peculiarly  alone,  as  he  never  married.  His  last  visit  was  to 
Lord  Stamford  at  Enville.  Soon  after  his  return  on  a  cold  Sunday 
morning,  he  developed  a  fever,  which  proved  fatal.  Bishop  Percy 
wrote  in  a  letter  at  that  time:  "I  know  not  any  private  gentleman 
whose  loss  had  occasioned  a  more  sincere  or  more  universal  con- 
cern. The  delicate  sensibility  of  his  writings,  the  consummate 
elegance  of  his  taste,  the  beauties  of  his  conversation,  and  the 
virtues  of  his  heart  had  procured  him  a  most  extensive  acquain- 
ance,  and  every  one  of  these  aspired  to  his  friendship"  (Percy- 
S  hens  tone,  p.  92). 


CHAPTER  III 

Periods  or  Interest  in  Shenstone 

As  my  bibliography  indicates,  interest  in  Shenstone  falls 
into  three  well-marked  periods:  the  half-century  following  his 
death,  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  the  early  part 
of  the  twentieth.  In  the  first  and  longest  of  these  periods  is  felt 
a  certain  personal  quality  in  the  memory  and  affection  of  his 
intimate  friends — Graves,  Jago,  Dodsley,  and  Bishop  Percy. 
The  year  after  his  death,  Dodsley,  with  well-meaning  friendship, 
but  with  too  little  heed  to  his  fastidious  friend's  wishes,  published 
Shenstone's  Works  in  Prose  and  Verse  in  two  volumes,  with  "deco- 
rations," a  Kfe,  a  description  of  the  Leasowes,  and  a  good-sized 
diagram  of  the  famous  ''ferme  ornee. "  To  these  was  added  as  a 
third  volume  five  years  later,  the  Letters  to  Particular  Friends. 
Other  editions  and  American  reprints  followed,  whether  of  the 
entire  works,  the  poems  alone,  or  the  essays.  The  latter  were 
bound  with  The  Idler  and  other  papers  in  a  volume  whose  rural 
frontispiece,  full-page  engravings,  and  artistic  monograms  would 
have  delighted  the  taste  of  our  essayist.  They  were  printed,  too, 
in  the  good  company  of  Goldsmith's  essays.  Doctor  Johnson 
both  honored  and  dishonored  Shenstone  in  writing  his  Life. 
Robert  Anderson  tried  to  rectify  the  unjust  sneers  of  Johnson. 
Richard  Graves,  Shenstone's  lifelong  friend,  who  outlived  him  by 
twenty-five  years,  wrote  his  little  volume  of  Recollections,  which 
have  ever  since  been  an  authority,  but  the  book  is  now  very  dif- 
ficult to  find.  Mason  and  Jago  took  delight  in  paying  tribute 
to  him  in  their  blank  verse  (Mason:  The  English  Garden;  Jago: 
Edgehill);  and  many  wrote  encomiums.  Lady  Luxborough's 
cordial  letters  to  Shenstone  were  published.  Alexander  Carlyle, 
in  his  diverting  autobiography,  wrote  with  zest  an  account  of  his 
visit  to  the  Leasowes  and  their  owner.  An  anonymous  poet 
printed  a  volume  with  Shenstone  as  the  almost  adored  hero  of  its 
narrative.     In    the    Gentleman's    Magazine    appeared    occasional 


8  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

notes  about  him,  as  well  as  plates  of  the  Hales-Owen  church, 
showing  where  he  is  buried,  of  the  "ruinated  castle"  at  Hagley 
Park,  of  which  there  was  a  vista  at  the  Leasowes,  and  of  the  house 
in  which  he  was  born  and  in  which  he  spent  most  of  his  adult  life — 
the  house  at  which  Doctor  Johnson  and  his  followers  sneer.  In 
the  same  magazine  were  printed,  too,  copies  of  Lyttleton's  inscrip- 
tion to  Shenstone  "on  a  neat  urn  encompassed  with  stately  oaks," 
and  of  Graves'  inscription  to  his  friend  on  the  urn  within  the 
Hales-Owen  church. 

I  must  not  neglect  mention  of  the  memorial  stone  to  Shenstone 
in  the  gardens  of  the  Marquis  de  Girardin  at  Ermenonville,  which 
the  owner  called  "the  Leasowes  of  France"  {Recollections,  p.  189). 
At  the  base  of  a  pyramid  in  memory  of  Theocritus,  Vergil,  and 
Thomson  {Recollections,  p.  189;  Curiosities  of  Literature,  III,  p. 
97)  is  a  slab  with  this  remarkable  inscription: 

This  plain  stone 
To  William  Shenstone. 
In  his  verses  he  displayed 
His  mind  natural; 
At  Leasowes  he  layed 
Arcadian  greens  rural. 
(Quoted  by  T.  R.  H.  Sturges  in  Notes  and  Queries,  sixth  series, 
rV,  p.  465,  from  Reflective  Tour  through  France  in  1778.)     This 
effusion,  which  might  have  made  Shenstone  smile  with  pleasure 
at  its  genuine  admiration  of  what  was  dearest  to  him,  smile  with 
approval  at  the  effort  for  simplicity  and  conciseness  in  an  unmas- 
tered  tongue,  and  smile  in  amusement  at  the  ear-torturing  rhyme, 
was  followed  by  his  stanzas  to  "Venus  fresh  rising  from  the  foamy 
tide." 

In  the  second  period  of  interest — the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century — the  poems  and  essays  were  republished.  Critical  esti- 
mates were  made  with  more  detachment,  but  sometimes  took  a 
whimsical  turn.  DTsraeh  gives,  in  his  Curiosities  of  Literature, 
two  interesting  chapters  to  Shenstone,  and  Mr.  Tuckerman  of 
Philadelphia  has,  in  his  Characteristics  of  Literature,  a  chapter 
devoted  to  Shenstone  as  the  dilettante,  in  which  he  holds  him  up, 
with  some  appreciation,  it  is  true,  but  chiefly  to  use  him  as  a 
warning  against  the  folly  of  being  anything  less  than  a  great 
genius.    Two  or  three  chapters  of  Hugh  Miller's  First  Impressions 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  9 

of  England  and  Its  People  are  given  to  appreciation  and  description 
of  the  Leasowes,  William  Shenstone,  and  his  works.  There  is  a 
pleasant  and  kindly  protest  made  by  E.  Jesse  {Once  a  Week,  VI, 
p.  722)  against  Johnson's  harsh  criticism.  The  author  of  an 
unsigned  article  in  Temple  Bar  (X,  397)  speaks  with  discrimination 
and  with  a  tone  of  authority,  giving  a  careful  review  of  Shenstone 
and  his  work,  and  assigning  to  him  a  decided  place  as  poetic  artist 
and  as  an  essayist  of  originality  and  admirable  suggestion.  In 
Notes  and  Queries  (third  series,  XII,  p.  289)  appeared  a  Hst  of  all 
the  successive  owners  of  the  Leasowes,  with  some  details  of  pur- 
chase. There  too  was  a  short  series  of  letters  in  regard  to  Shen- 
stone's  verses  inscribed  on  the  window  of  the  Red  Lion  Inn,  and  a 
statement  that  at  Harborough  Hall  are  still  to  be  seen  in  their 
original  position  several  lines  that  he  wrote  in  French  on  a  pane 
of  glass  (third  series,  XII,  p.  219). 

The  close  of  the  nineteenth  century  brings  in  the  third  period 
of  interest,  which  is  now  more  judicious  and  at  the  same  time 
more  appreciative.  Mr.  George  Saintsbury,  in  his  introduction 
to  the  selections  from  Shenstone  in  Ward's  English  Poets,  com- 
mends him  frankly  for  certain  unquestionable  merits,  calling  him 
a  "master  of  the  artificial-natural  style  in  poetry"  and  "a  poet 
somehow,"  though  not  a  great  poet.  Ten  years  later  Mr.  William 
H.  Hutton  writes  a  genial  chapter  on  the  owner  of  the  Leasowes, 
"one  who  has,  indeed,  some  claim  to  be  regarded  as  one  of  the 
earliest  masters  of  landscape-gardening,"  one  who  "has  some  of 
the  marks  of  the  true  poet,  and  certainly  not  a  few  of  the  kindly 
and  amiable  man."  Mr.  Beers  gives  several  pages  in  his  English 
Romanticism  in  the  Eighteenth  Century  to  a  discussion  of  his  poetry 
and  his  gardening.  The  Schoolmistress  was  held  worthy  by  Dr. 
Brandl  to  be  the  subject  of  a  doctoral  thesis  in  1908.  Most  recent 
is  the  publication  of  Shenstone's  correspondence  with  Bishop 
Percy,  edited  by  Dr.  Hans  Hecht  of  Basel,  who  sets  high  value  on 
his  critical  judgment  and  work  in  connection  with  the  Rcliques. 
In  Professor  William  Hulme's  most  readable  review  of  this  valuable 
book  {Modern  Language  Notes,  XXVH,  January,  1912)  he  takes 
the  opportunity  for  a  refreshing,  vigorous,  and  friendly  protest 
against  the  long-lived  criticisms  by  Dr.  Johnson,  Walpole,  and 
Gray,  and  praises  the  man,  the  critic,  the  letter-writer  in  no  uncer- 


10  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

tain  tone.  It  is  much  to  be  regretted  that  there  is  no  edition  or 
estimate  of  Shenstone's  essays  to  be  added  to  this  Ust.  They  are, 
it  seems  to  me,  a  most  characteristic  and  really  valuable  part  of 
his  work.  It  is  disappointing  to  seek  to  own  a  copy,  only  to  find 
that  they  are  out  of  print.  Something  yet  remains  to  be  done  for 
Shenstone. 


CHAPTER  IV 

Critical  Estimate 
Introduction 

To  be  misunderstood  and  misjudged,  and  in  consequence 
slighted  or  scorned,  is  perhaps  a  common  fate  of  human  beings 
and  especially  of  minor  authors.  To  render  even  belated  justice 
in  such  a  case  is  a  pleasant  and  honorable  task.  Having  ample 
material  for  the  purpose  renders  the  undertaking  doubly  pleasant 
and  kindles  the  hope  that  it  may  be  effective.  The  fact  that  the 
chief  judge  in  error  has  been  regarded  by  most  of  his  contemporaries, 
by  many  of  his  successors,  and  emphatically  by  himself,  as  the 
well-nigh  infallible  oracle  of  his  age,  gives  added  zest  to  the  work. 

William  Shenstone  has  suffered  for  more  than  a  century  from 
the  undue  harshness  of  literary  judges.  It  is  to  him  that  I  seek 
to  render  justice.  A  great  man  he  was  not,  nor  does  he  represent 
a  great  age;  but  he  is  to  an  unusual  degree  a  representative  of 
the  age  in  which  he  lived,  for  he  not  only  reflected  all  the  tenden- 
cies of  its  varied  literary  life,  but  also  shared  in  its  transitional 
nature.  His  was  an  age  of  gifted  letter-writers,  and  his  letters 
are  worthy  of  a  place  therein.  The  essay  was  still  in  favor,  and 
he  wrote  essays  that  should  not  be  forgotten.  It  had  been  an  age 
of  pastorals,  and  he  wrote  pastorals;  it  was  an  age  of  elegies,  and 
he  wrote  elegies;  it  was  an  age  of  fashionable  melancholy,  and  he 
had  by  nature  a  strain  of  melancholy,  which  he  did  not  fail  to 
express;  it  was  an  age  of  satire,  and  he  satirized  dry  learning  and 
pastoral  poetry  {Rape  of  the  Trap,  Colemira).  Imitations  of 
Spenser  were  popular  among  the  poets  of  his  day,  and  Shenstone 
wrote  one  of  the  earliest  and  the  best.  He  would  not  endure  pov- 
erty-stricken hmitation  to  any  one  metrical  form,  even  the  heroic 
couplet,  but,  in  the  newer  fashion,  tried  many.  Blank  verse, 
the  ballad  stanza,  quatrains  of  anapestic  trimeter,  rhyming 
couplets  of  four  iambic  feet,  the  irregular  ode,  the  trochaic  line, 
the  elegiac  stanza,  and  many  more,  he  used  not  unskilfully.     Didac- 


12  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

tic  poetry  was  all-powerful  and  all-popular,  and  Shenstone  was 
didactic  enough  for  his  age  in  several  of  his  longer  poems,  although 
he  exclaimed  to  a  friend,  "Alas!  I  do  not  like  formal  didactic 
poetry"  {Works,  III,  p.  78).  Ballads  were  beginning  to  find 
welcome  in  literary  circles;  Shenstone  felt  the  impulse  and  wrote 
the  ballad  of  Jemmy  Dawson.  A  school  of  landscape  poets  was 
rising;  he  wrote  landscape  in  his  verse;  and,  with  rocks,  water, 
and  trees,  upon  his  own  hillsides,  making  them  perhaps  the  best 
poem  he  ever  wrote.  The  little  common  things  and  events  of 
lowly  life  were  just  beginning,  in  Ramsay's  Gentle  Shepherd,  to 
appear  in  poetry;  to  this  beginning  Shenstone  gave  a  strong  im- 
petus in  his  Schoolmistress,  leading  the  way  for  Goldsmith  and 
Burns.  Writers  about  him  were  imitating  Milton;  this  Shenstone 
did  not  do  with  his  pen,  but  the  Leasowes  with  its  "arched  walks 
of  twilight  groves,"  its  "waters  murmuring,"  its  "close  covert  by 
some  brook,"  its  "mossy  cell,"  its  "bees  with  honeyed  thigh," 
shows  unmistakably  the  influence  of  II  Penseroso. 

Marked  changes  in  literature,  as  in  geology,  seldom  come  sud- 
denly. They  come  almost  unnoticed,  and  Shenstone  is  one  of 
the  foremost  to  mark  the  transition  from  pseudo-classicism  to 
romanticism,  from  an  adherence  to  forms  that  stifled  life  to  an 
exulting  life  that  surged  beyond  all  forms,  from  love  of  nature  in 
the  guise  of  the  ancients  to  love  of  nature  in  her  own  dewy  fresh- 
ness, from  professed  to  practiced  simplicity,  from  being  natural 
according  to  rule  to  being  natural  after  one's  own  heart.  He  felt 
and  followed  not  only  the  influence  of  French  artificiality  so  long 
dominant  in  England,  thanks  chiefly  to  Pope,  who  drew  his  rules 
from  Boileau;  but  he  felt  and  followed  also  the  first  stirring  of 
the  fresher,  newer  life,  which  developed  slowly  indeed,  and  was  to 
come  to  full  bloom  hardly  less  than  a  half-century  from  the  time 
of  his  death.  As  a  good  Augustan,  he  prized  "correctness"  highly 
and  was  "more  correct  than  Pope  himself,  particularly  in  his 
rhymes"  {Temple  Bar,  X,  p.  397);  he  felt  the  trammels  of  drawing- 
room  propriety  and  never  expressed  deep  emotion  in  his  poetry; 
and  he  praised  nature  in  the  good  set  terms  of  the  artificial  pas- 
toral. As  a  budding  romanticist,  however,  he  criticised  Boileau 
and  French  influence  rather  sharply  {Works,  II,  p.  175);  he  objected 
to  Pope's  heroic  metre  with  the  resulting  scantiness  and  con- 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  13 

straint  (Works,  I,  pp.  8-9),  and  used  it  in  but  one  or  two  of  his 
own  poems.  His  desire  for  naturalness  is  shown  in  as  diverse 
matters  as  hair-dressing,  gardening,  and  Uterature.  He  even 
persisted,  despite  all  taunts  at  Oxford,  in  "wearing  his  own  hair" — 
and  it  was  not  handsome — in  those  years  when  every  school-boy, 
as  soon  as  he  entered  the  university,  cut  off  his  locks,  whatever 
they  were,  and  put  on  a  wig  (Recollections,  p.  25).  Hedges  and 
clipped  trees  were  too  artificial  for  his  grounds,  where,  close  to 
nature,  he  lived  his  poetry  (Works,  II,  pp.  137,  140).  On  natural- 
ness in  all  forms  of  literature  he  insisted  over  and  over  again,  and 
he  showed  his  appreciation  of  the  natural  poetry  of  the  people 
by  encouraging  and  urging  Percy  to  publish  his  manuscript  of 
old  ballads,  albeit  with  some  "correcting." 

To  estimate  Shenstone  fairly,  we  must  give  him  his  due,  not 
merely  in  one  or  two  phases  of  his  work,  but  in  each  of  the  fields 
where  he  made  his  mark — as  man,  as  landscape-gardener,  as  poet, 
as  essayist,  as  letter-writer,  as  literary  critic.  He  has  been  blamed 
in  all;  he  has  been  praised  in  all;  but  the  critical  discussions  have 
been  fragmentary  or  incomplete.  One  writer  has  considered 
only  his  poetry  and  his  character;  another  has  added  a  considera- 
tion of  his  landscape  work;  one  has  praised  his  essays  only,  and 
held  his  letters  unworthy  of  notice;  another  has  given  all  his 
attention  to  his  work  as  literary  critic  as  shown  in  one  volume  of 
his  correspondence;  one  has  thought  only  of  the  poetry;  and  still 
another  has  discussed  one  poem  only.  To  give  a  well-rounded 
appreciation  of  this  versatile  man,  so  likable  and  so  true  in  every- 
thing that  he  did,  is  the  aim  of  the  present  writer. 

Character 

Shenstone's  amiabiUty  was  praised  by  all  who  knew  him 
directly  or  indirectly.  Dodsley,  Graves,  Bishop  Percy,  and  all 
his  other  intimate  friends  could  not  say  too  much  of  it.  Every 
one  liked  him  and  enjoyed  the  genuine  courtesy  of  his  manner; 
every  one  who  knew  him  wished  to  know  him  better.  It  is  only 
a  whimsical  moralist  who  pauses  to  lament  that  amiability  is  a 
negative  rather  than  a  positive  virtue  (Tuckerman  :  chapter 
on  the  Dilettante).  The  deeply  affectionate  nature  of  the  man 
is  felt  in  almost  every  letter  of  his.     He  clings  to  Graves,  Jago, 


14  ^^^LLIAM  shenstone  and  his  critics 

Whistler,  Percy,  with  many  an  expression  of  heartfelt  friendship. 
His  friends  were  so  much  to  him,  present  or  long  absent,  that  he 
could  not  bear  the  thought  of  the  sUghtest  estrangement  or  mis- 
understanding. He  was  "the  warmest  and  most  affectionate 
friend,"  says  Graves.  The  depth  and  strength  of  his  love  for 
his  brother  Joseph,  who  is  so  often  and  so  kindly  remembered 
in  the  letters  of  Lady  Luxborough,  is  revealed  in  his  letter  telling 
his  loss  to  Graves — a  loss  which  had  a  lasting  effect  upon  him. 

He  cared  much,  not  only  for  the  few  intimates,  but  for  the 
frequent  company  of  other  people  with  congenial  tastes,  not,  as 
he  wrote,  "persons  of  vulgar  minds,  who  will  despise  you  for  the 
want  of  a  good  set  of  chairs,  or  an  uncouth  fire  shovel,  at  the  same 
time  that  they  can't  taste  any  excellence  in  a  mind  that  over- 
looks these  things.  .  .  .  Indeed,  one  loses  much  of  one's  acquisi- 
tions in  virtue  in  an  hour's  converse  with  such  a  judge  of  merit 
by  money,  etc."  (Burford  Papers,  p.  188).  His  neighbors,  Lord 
Lyttleton  and  his  family.  Lord  Dudley,  Mr.  Hylton,  and  Admiral 
Smith,  and,  living  at  a  distance,  Joseph  Spence  and  James  Thom- 
son, were  valued  friends;  the  correspondence  with  Lady  Lux- 
borough,  lasting  through  almost  twenty  years,  was  a  constant 
source  of  pleasure;  and  after  the  earlier  years  at  the  Leasowes, 
the  place  and  its  owner  attracted  as  many  literary  guests,  gentry, 
and  nobles,  from  at  home  and  abroad,  as  he  could  desire.  He 
passed  the  last  years  of  his  life  "in  great  credit  and  reputation" 
(Recollections,  p.  164).  His  letters  and  essays  show  an  easy, 
thorough  understanding  of  human  nature,  a  widely  tolerant  spirit, 
and  an  ability  to  read  and  appreciate  not  only  people  of  his  own 
type,  but  also  those  entirely  different.  The  touching  inscription 
to  his  Httle  dog,  FUrtilla  (Manuscript),  shows  us  the  tenderness 
of  her  master's  heart.  The  satisfying  tribute  to  the  memory  of 
M.  A.  (Manuscript) — without  doubt  the  faithful  housekeeper, 
Mrs.  Arnold,  who  took  such  good  care  of  her  master  and  was  so 
motherly  to  his  hens  (Works,  HI,  p.  5) — shows  his  appreciation  of 
faithful  service. 

Shy  and  retiring  by  nature,  he  felt  an  awkward  restraint  on 
first  meeting  strangers,  and  was  often  silent;  but  as  soon  as  this 
passed,  his  face  lost  its  heavy  look,  and  his  conversation  was 
sprightly,  dehghting  his  companions.     He  was  most  concise  in 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  15 

his  relating  of  facts,  and  a  skiKul  teller  of  stories.  We  see  him, 
robust  rather  than  elegant  of  form,  dressed  in  his  favorite  blue 
coat  and  gold-laced  scarlet  waistcoat  {Recollections,  p.  179),  or 
perhaps  in  his  white  suit  with  silver  lace  (A.  Carlyle:  Autobiog- 
raphy), telUng  an  amusing  anecdote  to  those  about  him.  He 
omitted  not  a  circumstance  that  could  heighten  the  effect  and 
added  not  a  word  that  could  lessen  it.  His  expression  was  rigidly 
grave  till  he  reached  the  point,  but  then  his  whole  face  brightened 
with  such  mirth  that,  like  a  flash,  it  seized  the  whole  company 
{Recollections,  p.  173).  Dearly  did  he  love  to  tease  his  friends, 
but  he  stopped  at  once  if  it  began  to  hurt  their  feelings,  for  he 
could  not  bear  to  give  pain,  even  to  animals  {Works,  II,  p.  279). 
His  love  of  fun  is  seen  at  its  height  in  the  joke  which,  with  the  help 
of  Percy  and  one  or  two  others,  he  played  for  months  upon  his 
neighbor  Hylton,  who  had,  Shenstone  thought,  an  undue  venera- 
tion for  antique  curiosities  (Percy-5/zew^/o«^,  pp.  19,  23,25,28,34, 
37).  Through  a  correspondence  supposedly  with  a  certain  honor- 
able Birmingham  dealer  in  such  wares,  Mr.  Hylton  was  led  to 
make  arrangements  for  the  carving  of  a  valuable  cup  from  the 
wood  of  a  mulberry-tree  planted  by  Shakespeare.  On  it  was 
carved  Shakespeare  himself  wearing  a  gardener's  apron  and  in 
the  act  of  planting  the  tree ;  on  another  side  was  the  dealer  making 
oath  before  the  Mayor  of  Stratford  that  the  wood  was  genuine. 
Shenstone  wrote  with  glee  that  he  had  procured  for  Hylton  "a 
real  King  William's  bib"  and  the  spoon  with  which  "old  Parr 
ate  buttermilk. "  Percy  contributed  a  remarkable  modern-ancient 
coin,  a  shell  with  a  hole  in  it,  a  small  Nemean  lion  of  red  clay, 
and  other  objects,  all  with  suitably  striking  descriptions  or  his- 
tories attached.  Percy  feared  that  some  lasting  grudge  or  dislike 
of  him  might  result,  but  Shenstone  vowed  "by  the  porringer  of 
old  Parr"  that  no  such  result  should  follow.  In  reality  it  did  not, 
though  when  at  last  the  secret  came  out,  Hylton  was  not  quite 
so  much  amused  as  his  friend  had  expected  at  the  excellence  of 
the  joke. 

To  Shenstone's  benevolence,  never  touched  on  by  himself  even 
in  his  most  intimate  letters,  we  have  ample  witness.  Dodsley 
writes,  "His  friends,  his  domestics,  his  poor  neighbors,  all  daily 
experienced  his  benevolent  turn  of  mind.     Indeed,   this  virtue 


16  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

in  him  was  often  carried  to  such  excess  that  it  sometimes  bordered 
upon  weakness"  (Works,l,'Pveisice,  p.  ii).  Alexander  Carlyle,  on 
his  one  visit  to  the  Leasowes,  saw  the  owner  turn  aside  from  his 
distinguished  guest  to  talk  for  some  time  with  an  emaciated  young 
woman  in  the  last  stages  of  consumption.  On  his  return  he  ex- 
plained that  she  was  a  sickly  neighbor,  to  whom  he  had  given  a 
key  to  his  grounds,  as  she  delighted  in  them.  Graves,  in  his 
Recollections,  says  that  Shenstone  was  "never  so  happy  as  when 
he  could  do  any  little  service  to  his  relations,  his  friends,  or  his 
neighbors,  by  his  advice,  his  influence,  or  even  his  purse,  as  far 
as  his  slender  income  would  permit"  (Recollections,  p.  157).  "His 
will  was  dictated  with  equal  justice  and  generosity,"  and  his 
estate  left  ample  means  to  pay  all  his  debts,  his  legacies  to  his 
friends,  and  an  annuity  of  thirty  pounds  to  one  servant  and  of 
six  pounds  to  another  {Recollections,  pp.  71,  73). 

A  more  pretentious  and  particularly  interesting  tribute  to  this 
same  trait  is  a  poem  called  Shenstone:  or  The  Force  of  Benevolence, 
printed  anonymously  in  1776,  and  filling  a  rather  thin  quarto 
volume  of  pleasing  press  work,  with  three  plates.  The  author  sold 
it  at  the  Red  Lion  Inn  at  the  price  of  two  shilUngs.  Its  rhyming 
couplets  in  the  style  of  Pope  are  evidently  a  labor  of  love,  and 
are  dedicated  thus:  "To  those  who,  amidst  affluence,  descend  to 
visit  the  low  abodes  of  the  afflicted,  and  find  more  feUcity  in  allevi- 
ating the  wants  of  their  fellow-creatures  than  in  the  gaudy  pagean- 
try of  courts,  midnight  revelry,  and  fashionable  dissipation." 
The  writer  was  acquainted  with  Shenstone.  He  writes,  "The 
man  I  celebrate  was  not  a  lord,  but  he  was  virtuous;  his  worldly 
possessions  were  not  mighty,  but  he  had  humanity.  Unknown  to 
courts,  he  lived  a  life  recluse  in  dafliance  with  his  favorite  muse. 
Benevolence  was  his  bosom's  chief  est  tenant."  The  story,  which 
we  are  assured  is  no  fiction,  shows  "the  Leasowes'  lord"  wandering 
with  his  Delia  along  "the  glassy  rills"  and  the  "embroidered 
margin  of  the  limpid  lake,"  hoping  for  her  approval  of  the  seat 
made  in  honor  of  Thomson,  and  wishing  that  she  herself  might 
be  content  to  dwell  "where  bashful  cowslips  rise  to  kiss  her  feet." 
Suddenly  an  armed  rustic  attacked  him  with  oaths: 

To  Shenstone's  head  the  tube  of  death  was  reared. 
The  robber  trembled  (not  the  good  man  feared) . 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  17 

Shenstone  spoke  "with  the  kindest  heart  beneath  the  sky,"  and 
learned  it  was  desperate  need  that  had  led  to  this  desperate  action. 
He  handed  out  his  purse  as  a  gift,  said  he  wished  the  man  no  ill, 
and  advised  him  to  hasten  away.  As  he  ran  far  on  his  way,  a 
trusty  servant  saw  him  throw  his  weapon  into  the  lake  and  fol- 
lowed him  to  a  miserable  hovel  in  Hales-Owen.  There  were  the 
starving  wife  and  children.  The  father  poured  the  gold  upon 
the  floor,  and  confessed  with  remorse  that  he  had  robbed  "the 
kindest  of  the  human  race. "  CoUn  told  his  master  all  that  he 
had  seen  and  heard  through  a  crack  in  the  wall.  Shenstone,  like 
a  modern  philanthropist,  made  inquiries,  and  finding  that  the 
poor  man  was  really  worthy,  but  hard-pressed,  hurried  to  the 
hovel,  forgave  all,  and  told  him  to  bring  his  family  the  next  day 
to  live  at  the  Leasowes  with  "  the  cherub  Peace. "     There,  said  he, 

Help  me  my  buildings  and  my  grots  to  rear; 

Direct  my  alleys,  turn  the  mellow  soil; 

For  you,  I  know,  are  used  to  sylvan  toil. 

Shenstone  would  keep  the  secret  of  the  attempted  crime. 
Soon  to  the  Leasowes  sped  the  gladsome  swain, 
And  soon  Hygeia  decked  his  infant  train. 

He  worked  faithfully  for  his  master  till  the  latter's  death,  and  lived 

on 

Till  the  Great  Author  of  Benevolence 


Called  him,  resigned,  from  this  his  low  abode, 
To  join  at  once  his  Shenstone  and  his  God. 

I  am  strongly  of  the  opinion,  though  with  no  real  proof,  that 
the  admiring  author  of  this  poem  is  the  young  journeyman  shoe- 
maker, Woodhouse,  of  whose  verses  and  literary  tastes  Shen- 
stone wrote  to  Sherrington  Davenport  (Works,  III,  p.  394).  He 
gave  this  man  advice  and  help  in  his  literary  pursuits,  as  he  did  to 
Miss  Wheatley,  to  Vernon,  and  to  all  others  with  such  tastes  whom 
he  could  assist  (Anderson:  Poets,  IX,  p.  588).  Graves  tells  us, 
moreover,  that  "his  encouragement  of  the  ingenious  Woodhouse 
recommended  him  to  a  patroness  [Lady  Luxborough,  very  likely] 
who  placed  him  in  a  situation  where  he  had  leisure  to  gratify  his 
taste  for  literary  pursuits"  (Recollections,  p.  158).  What  more 
natural  than  that  he  should  satisfy  both  his  taste  and  his  gratitude 
by  praising  in  verse  his  helpful  patron,  of  whose  kindness  in  the 


18  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

neighborhood  he  must  have  heard  much?  Very  likely  the  basis 
of  plot  in  the  poem  was  the  fact,  barely  stated  by  Graves,  that 
Shenstone  was  censured  for  not  insisting  on  the  transportation  of 
a  man  wdth  five  children  who  had  robbed  the  fish  ponds  at  the 
Leasowes  {Recollections,  p.  182). 

All  admit  that  Shenstone  had  no  vices,  but  Mr.  Gilfillan  and 
others  make  the  charge  that  he  was  indolent.  Far  be  it  from  me 
to  attempt  any  full  denial  of  the  charge.  Shenstone  recognized 
this  quality  in  himself,  and  sometimes  lamented  that  he  did  not, 
as  his  critics  say  he  should  have  done,  take  active  steps  to  enlarge 
his  fortune.  Yet  the  literary  world  has  other  examples  of  lack 
of  industry.  Coleridge,  Cowper,  even  Wordsworth,  were  not 
active,  practical  men.  But  Shenstone's  output  of  poetry  was  not 
so  strangely  small  as  Gray's,  and  his  life  was  but  little  longer; 
his  letters  are  not  few;  his  essays  fill  a  volume  of  a  few  hundred 
pages,  entertaining  and  suggestive,  wherever  you  open  it.  More- 
over, the  planning  and  carrying  out,  with  scanty  means,  of  the 
transformation  of  a  farm  into  a  paradise  is  hardly  the  mere  amuse- 
ment of  an  idle  hour  any  more  than  was  the  transformation,  with 
abundant  dollars  and  workmen,  of  Back  Bay  mud-holes  into  a 
beautiful  drive  and  park.  Indeed,  it  was  far  less  so,  for  the  first 
principles  of  landscape-gardening  must  then  be  developed  in  the 
same  hour.  The  owner  of  the  estate  must  often  have  been  work- 
man as  well  as  supervisor.  "I  make  people  wonder,"  he  writes, 
"at  my  exploits  in  pulling  down  walls,  hovels,  cow-houses"  {Bur- 
ford  Papers,  p.  188).  And  again,  "One  piece  of  water  below  my 
priory  has  confined  me,  employed  my  servants,  and  enslaved  my 
horses  all  this  year"  {Percy-Shenstone,  p.  41).  Perhaps  he  would 
have  been  stronger  of  body  and  more  constantly  in  good  spirits 
if  he  had  been  more  active,  yet  he  gained  much  by  the  reposeful 
quiet  of  his  country  life.  He  avoided  in  large  measure  the  "be- 
coming unconsciously  something  like  thorns"  in  anxiety  to  bear 
grapes,  and  the  "impoverishment  in  spirit  and  temper"  of  which 
Pater  speaks  as  possible  "in  the  pursuit  of  even  great  ends";  and 
he  had  a  Httle  share,  it  may  be,  in  "the  intangible  perfection  of 
those  whose  ideal  is  rather  in  being  than  in  doing  .  .  .  whose 
manners  are  in  the  deepest,  as  in  the  simplest,  sense,  morals" 
(Pater:  Appreciations,  pp.  60,  61).     Lady  Luxborough  may  not 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  19 

have  been  far  wrong  when  she  responded  to  his  self-condemnation, 
"You  are  not  the  idle  man  of  creation.  .  .  .  Your  pen,  your 
pencil,  your  taste,  and  your  sincere,  cheerful  conduct  in  life  (which 
are  the  things  that  make  you  appear  idle)  give  such  an  example 
as  it  were  to  be  wished  might  be  more  generally  followed — few 
have  the  capacity,  fewer  have  the  honesty  to  spend  their  time  so 
usefully  as  well  as  unblamably  "  (Lady  Luxborough:  Letters,  p.  106). 

As  householder,  Shenstone  has  been  judged  almost  exclusively 
by  Dr.  Johnson's  emphatic  words: 

"His  house  was  mean,  and  he  did  not  improve  it;  his  care  was 
for  his  grounds.  When  he  came  home  from  his  walks,  he  might 
find  his  floors  flooded  by  a  shower  through  the  broken  roof;  but 
he  could  spare  no  money  for  its  reparation.  In  time  his  expenses 
brought  clamors  about  him  that  overpowered  the  lamb's  bleat 
and  the  linnet's  song;  and  his  groves  were  haunted  by  beings  very 
different  from  fauns  and  fairies.  He  spent  his  estate  in  adorning 
it,  and  his  death  was  probably  hastened  by  his  anxieties"  (Johnson: 
Works,  III,  p.  352).  This  harshness  is  hardly  lessened  by  the 
addition  that  a  pension  "could  not  have  been  ever  more  properly 
bestowed"  than  on  this  man. 

The  whole  matter  would  be  scarcely  worth  attention,  if  the 
dictator's  word  had  not  been  so  loudly  and  positively  spoken,  so 
universally  believed,  so  emphatically  echoed,  and  so  often  used 
through  following  generations  as  a  reproach  against  unoffending 
Shenstone  and  as  a  starting-point  for  further  censure.  One  is 
tempted  to  ask  why,  if  the  owner  found  pleasure  in  embellishing  his 
grounds  at  the  sacrifice  of  his  house,  he  had  not  a  perfect  right  to  do 
as  he  pleased.  He  had  no  family  dependent  on  him,  and  none  but 
distant  and  uncongenial  relatives — manufacturers  of  buttons — 
to  whom  to  leave  his  property.  But  Johnson  is  without  doubt 
far  from  the  facts.  Shenstone's  letters  tell  several  times  of  paper- 
ing and  of  other  changes  in  the  house,  of  paintings  and  busts  for 
it,  of  careful  and  comfortable  arrangements  of  furniture  {Works, 
III,  pp.  158,  159,  224,  233,  235,  327).  The  picture  of  the  house 
in  the  Gentleman's  Magazine  for  December,  1811  (vol.  87,  part  2, 
p.  505),  made  from  a  drawing  done  by  Shenstone  in  1744,  before 
any  of  his  changes  had  been  made,  shows  a  comfortable  house  with 
two  gables,  a  cupola,  and  three  chimneys.     "This  house,"  says 


20  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Parkes,  "by  considerable  additions  and  alterations,  aided  by  the 
ingenuity  and  taste  of  Shenstone,  was  rendered  a  very  respectable 
dwelling  and  remained  till  1775."  Some  particulars  of  this 
exercise  of  taste  and  ingenuity  we  learn  from  the  two  friends  of 
Shenstone,  Richard  Graves  and  Bishop  Percy.  They  with  their 
wives  had  visited  the  Leasowes  more  than  once  for  at  least  a  few 
days  at  a  time,  but  Johnson  had  never  done  so.  In  regard  to  the 
possibility,  Percy  \\Tites  to  Shenstone,  "He  even  talks  of  taking  a 
journey  down  to  the  Leasowes,  but  this  you  must  not  much  depend 
on;  he  is  no  more  formed  for  long  journeys  than  a  tortoise"  {Percy- 
Shenstone,  p.  55). 

Mr.  Graves,  good  parish  priest,  asserts  that  the  house  was  by 
no  means  so  much  neglected  "as  Doctor  Johnson's  intelligence 
seems  to  imply,"  and  expresses  the  conviction  that  the  facetious 
intimation  of  his  groves  being  haunted  by  duns  is  a  groundless 
surmise.  "Mr.  Shenstone  was  too  much  respected  in  the  neigh- 
borhood to  be  treated  with  rudeness.  ,  .  .  He  gave  his  hall  some 
air  of  magnificence  by  sinking  the  floor,  and  giving  it  an  altitude 
of  ten  feet  instead  of  seven.  By  his  own  good  taste  and  his  mechan- 
ical skill  he  acquired  two  tolerably  elegant  rooms  from  a  mere 
farm-house"  {Recollections,  pp.  71-73).  To  Anderson  Bishop 
Percy  wrote: 

"Johnson  had  committed  great  mistakes  with  respect  to  Shen- 
stone. .  .  .  He  grossly  misrepresented  both  his  circumstances 
and  his  house,  which  was  small  but  elegant,  and  displayed  a  great 
deal  of  taste  in  the  alterations  and  accommodation  of  the  apart- 
ments, etc.  On  his  sideboard  he  had  a  neat  marble  cistern,  which, 
by  turning  a  cock,  was  fed  with  living  water;  and  he  had  many 
other  little  elegant  contrivances,  which  displayed  his  genius  and 
made  me  regret  that  this  Httle  elegant  Temple  of  the  Muses  was 
pulled  down  for  the  larger  building  of  Mr.  Home.  .  .  In  the 
value  of  purchase  how  much  Mr.  Shenstone's  estate  was  improved 
by  his  taste  will  be  judged  from  the  price  it  fetched  when  sold  at 
auction  in  1795,  being  seventeen  thousand  pounds  sterling,  though 
when  it  descended  to  him,  it  was  only  valued  at  three  hundred 
pounds  a  year  "  {Nichols:  Illustrations  of  Literature, VII,  pp.  15 1-152) . 

Moreover,  Shenstone  was  in  the  habit  of  entertaining  guests 
of  distinction  not  infrequently.     One  day  he  casually  mentions 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  2  1 

three  guests  with  five  servants  (Works,  III,  p.  226,  227);  again, 
five  guests  at  tea  (pp.  184-185);  yet  again,  ten  dinner  guests  with 
six  footmen  (p.  171).  Did  he  invite  these  guests,  many  of  them 
nobles,  to  sit  at  his  table  under  a  leaky  roof  through  which  the 
ready  EngUsh  rain  might  come  at  any  moment  and  drench  table, 
floor,  and  feet?  Lady  Luxborough  used  to  visit  the  Leasowes 
often,  planned  to  do  so  annually.  She  brought  friends  and  ser- 
vants with  her  and  stayed  over  night  (Lady  Luxborough:  Letters, 
pp.  5,  260,  308,  393,  414).  There  she  met  Lord  Dudley,  his  sister, 
and  others  whom  she  called  "extremely  agreeable"  (Lady  Lux- 
borough: Letters,  p.  51).  There  at  another  time  she  and  Lord 
Dudley  feasted  on  one  of  Shenstone's  own  fowls,  which,  she  de- 
clares, "must  have  been  a  phoenix.  How  could  we  have  been  both 
so  elegantly  feasted  by  any  common  bird?"  (p.  69)  This  courte- 
ous and  friendly  lady  was  hardly  lodged  in  a  mean,  shabby,  neg- 
lected house,  only  half  protected  from  cold  and  storm.  We  must 
understand  Shenstone's  expressions  concerning  the  humbleness 
of  his  abode  as  we  do  those  of  this  gentle  lady  when  she  calls  her 
mansion  at  Barrells  her  "cell,"  and  her  estate,  which  she  had 
"fitted  up  in  elegant  style,"  her  fer me  negligee  (Recollections,  p. 
114;  Lady  Luxborough:  Letters,  p.  37). 

The  estate  was  not  exhausted  by  its  adornments,  as  is  plain 
from  the  statements  of  Mr.  Graves: 

"Though  his  works  (frugally  as  they  were  managed)  added  to 
his  manner  of  living,  must  necessarily  have  made  him  exceed  his 
income,  and  of  course  he  might  sometimes  be  distressed  for  money, 
yet  he  had  too  much  spirit  to  expose  himself  to  insults  for  trifling 
sums,  and  guarded  against  any  greater  distress  by  anticipating  a 
few  hundreds,  which  his  estate  could  very  well  bear,  as  appeared 
by  what  remained  to  his  executors  after  the  pajonent  of  his  debts 
and  his  legacies"  (Recollections,  pp.  71-72). 

There  is,  then,  not  the  slightest  foundation  in  fact  for  these 
sneers  of  Johnson.  The  truth  of  the  matter  seems  to  be  that  his 
injustice  is  due  half  to  his  ignorance  of  facts,  his  domineering  spirit, 
and  a  certain  ingrained  jealousy,  and  half  to  the  dulness  of  his 
weighty  mind  in  perceiving  humor.  Plainly  he  took  in  all  serious- 
ness the  verses  on  The  Poet  and  the  Dun;  the  lines  found  in  The 
Progress  of  Taste: 


22  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

When  all  the  structure  shone  complete, 
Not  much  convenient,  wondrous  neat, 


Ah  me!   ('twas  Damon's  own  confession) 
Came  Poverty  and  took  possession; 

and  the  description,  which  Shenstone  himself  calls  a  humorous 
addition  to  his  poem,  Economy,  a  rhapsody  addressed  to  young 
poets,  and  perhaps  written  at  Lady  Luxborough's  request  that  he 
should  give  her  some  rules  on  economy  (letter  of  Lady  Luxborough 
quoted  in  Shenstone:  or  The  Force  of  Benevolence,  note,  p.  12). 
In  this  postscript — part  third  of  Shenstone's  poem — we  read  of 

The  poet's  roofs,  the  careless  poet's,  his 

Who  scorns  advice; 

of  his  room  decked  with  fluttering  spider-webs, 

Cell  ever  squalid,  where  the  sneerful  maid 
Will  not  fatigue  her  hand,  broom  never  comes; 

of  the  walls 

in  fady  texture  clad, 
WTiere  wandering  snails  in  many  a  shmy  path. 
Free,  unrestrained,  their  various  journeys  crawl; 

of  the  poet's  chair  with  "fractured  seat  infirm"  and  "aged  cush- 
ion" full  of  dust.  Johnson  at  once  jumps  clumsily  to  the  con- 
clusion that  all  this  is  true  of  the  bard  of  the  Leasowes,  and  forth- 
with issues  his  dictum  holding  the  unthrift  poet  up  to  ridicule. 
Truly,  humor  to  be  read  by  Johnson  should  be  carefully  and 
plainly  labeled! 

The  supercilious  or  over-serious  fault-finder  has  sometimes 
blamed  the  transformer  of  the  Leasowes  for  vanity  in  hearing  his 
place  praised.  Walpole's  superficial  criticism  in  this  connection 
has  been  longer-lived  and  more  influential  than  it  deserves,  as 
much  of  the  world  listened  eagerly  to  "the  pleasant  Horace." 
Of  Shenstone  he  writes: 

"Poor  man!  he  wanted  to  have  all  the  world  talk  of  him  for 
the  pretty  place  he  had  made,  which  he  seems  to  have  made  only 
that  it  might  be  talked  of.  The  first  time  a  company  came  to  see 
my  house  I  felt  his  joy.  I  am  now  so  tired  of  it  that  I  shudder 
when  the  bell  rings  at  the  gate.  It  is  as  bad  as  keeping  an  inn,  and 
I  am  often  tempted  to  deny  its  being  shown"  (Walpole:  Works,  V, 
p.   169). 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  23 

One  can  hardly  help  suspecting  a  little  jealousy,  and  detecting 
more  insincerity,  in  this  light  superciliousness  of  the  owner  of 
"a  house  full  of  playthings,"  of  which  he  said  he  was  as  "fond  as 
any  bishop  is  of  his  bishopric."  This  simple  house  had  "thirty- 
two  windows  enriched  with  painted  glass."  While  Walpole  was 
lavishing  much  of  his  large  fortune  thus,  Shenstone  was  making 
his  home  in  the  pasture-lands  beautiful  and  famous  with  only  three 
hundred  a  year  and  his  own  affectionate  supervision.  Well  might 
the  man  of  wealth  envy  his  skill.  As  to  the  pleasure  of  having 
Strawberry  Hill  admired,  one  friend,  at  least,  understood  that  it 
was  a  pleasure  by  no  means  worn  out  to  the  owner,  however  much 
he  might  wish  it  to  appear  so.  Having  complained  to  his  keen- 
sighted  friend,  Madame  du  Deffand,  of  the  intrusions  on  his 
privacy,  he  received  the  ready  reply,  "Oh!  vous  n'etes  point  fache 
qu'  on  vienne  voir  votre  chateau;  vous  ne  I'avez  pas  fait  singulier; 
vous  ne  I'avez  rempli  de  choses  precieuses,  de  raretes  .  .  .  pour  y 
rester  seul  ou  ne  recevoir  que  vos  amis"  (Walpole:  Letters,  edited 
by  Cunningham,  V,  p.  169,  note).  This  was  not  the  only  time 
Walpole  had  expressed  a  modesty  and  humility  that  were  only 
outward.  As  Shenstone  remarks,  "A  man  sooner  finds  out  his 
own  foibles  in  another  than  any  other  foibles"  {Works,  II,  p.  227). 

A  marked  trait  of  Shenstone,  which  seems  his  by  instinct  as 
well  as  by  cultivation,  and  which  casts  its  charm  over  everything 
he  did,  is  his  love  of  a  sequestered  life  and  his  unfailing  delight  in 
woods,  waters,  and  all  things  rural.  He  called  himself  "a  rural 
enthusiast"  {Once  a  Week,  VI).  Yet  the  genuineness  of  this 
feeling  has  been  more  than  questioned  by  the  poet  Gray  in  words 
quoted  and  beUeved  by  nearly  every  following  writer  on  Shen- 
stone: 

"I  have  read  an  octavo  volume  of  Shenstone's  letters;  poor 
man!  he  was  always  wishing  for  money,  for  fame,  and  other 
distinctions;  and  his  whole  philosophy  consisted  in  living  against 
his  will  in  retirement,  and  in  a  place  which  his  taste  had  adorned, 
but  which  he  only  enjoyed  when  people  of  note  came  to  see  him 
and  commend  it"  (Gray:  Works,  edited  by  Gosse,  III,  p.  344). 

This  remark  is  quoted  with  as  much  patronizing  satisfaction 
as  Johnson's  saying  about  the  broken-roofed  house;  and  it  seems 
to  me  equally  unfounded.     That  oft-echoed  phrase,  "Poor  man!" 


24  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

has  labeled  Shenstone  as  an  object  of  pity.  What  is  Gray's 
authority  for  saying  that  he  lived  "against  his  will  in  retirement"? 
Gray,  the  sensitive,  with  his  own  love  of  retirement,  should  have 
understood  better.  How  did  he  fail  to  perceive  in  another  a  real 
love  of  rural  life,  appearing  almost  constantly  in  Shenstone's 
poetry   and  so  often  in  his  letters,  when  he  himself  felt  thus: 

"Happy  they  that  can  create  a  rose-tree,  or  erect  a  honey- 
suckle, that  can  watch  the  brood  of  a  hen,  or  see  a  fleet  of  their 
OWQ  duckUngs  launch  into  the  water.  It  is  with  a  sentiment  of 
envy  I  speak  of  it"  (Gray:  Letters,  edited  by  Rideout,  p.  131). 

He  found  in  Shenstone's  letters  occasional  wishes  for  money, 
to  be  sure,  but  no  sordid  wishes  for  it.  Indeed,  Shenstone  had  the 
independence  to  decline  an  offer  of  two  hundred  pounds,  delicately 
made  by  WilUam  Pitt,  for  improvements  about  the  Leasowes 
that  the  owner  could  not  afford  to  make  {Recollections,  pp.  82-83). 
In  the  letters  he  wrote,  "If  I  wish  for  a  large  fortune,  it  is  rather 
for  the  sake  of  my  friends  than  myself.  ...  It  is  to  gratify 
myself  in  the  company  and  in  the  gratifications  of  my  friends" 
{Works,  III,  p.   19). 

"Alas,  that  I  cannot  spare  money  to  drain  and  to  improve  my 
lands"  (p.  292). 

"If  I  had  three  hundred  pounds  to  lay  out  about  the  Lea- 
sowes, I  could  bring  my  ambition  to  peaceable  terms"  (p.  85). 

There  is  a  note  of  dissatisfaction,  it  is  true,  in  the  words,  "I 
have  often  thought,  myself,  that  were  a  person  to  live  at  the 
Leasowes  of  more  merit  than  myself  and  a  few  degrees  more 
worldly  prudence,  he  could  scarce  want  opportunities  to  procure 
his  own  advancement"  (p.  166).  And  there  are  some  natural 
expressions  of  ungratified  desire  for  recognition  and  advancement, 
such  as  the  following,  which  is  half  in  play: — "Every  one  gets 
posts,  preferments,  but  myself.  Nothing  but  my  ambition  can 
set  me  on  a  footing  with  them  and  make  me  easy.  Come  then, 
lordly  pride"  (p.  82).  But  there  are  frequent  emphatic  expres- 
sions of  love  for  the  quiet  of  his  home,  love  for  the  home  itself. 
Here  are  a  few  of  them: 

"I  never  leave  home  but  with  reluctance.  I  really  love  no 
PLACE  so  well;  and  it  is  a  great  favor  in  me  to  allow  any  one  a 
week  of  my  summer"  (p.  251). 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  25 

After  a  visit  to  Lord  Ward,  Lord  Gray,  and  the  Worcester 
Music-meeting:  "Very  many  of  the  noblesse,  whom  I  had  seen 
at  the  Leasowes,  were  as  complaisant  to  me  as  possible;  whereas 
it  was  my  former  fate  in  public  places  to  be  as  little  regarded  as 
a  journeyman  shoemaker.  .  .  .  On  the  whole,  I  was  not  a  little 
pleased  that  I  had  made  this  excursion,  and  returned  with  double 
relish  to  the  enjoyment  of  my  farm"  (p.  319). 

"Very  happy  do  I  think  myself,  when,  after  a  continual  suc- 
cession of  company,  visits  paid,  and  excursions  taken,  I  can  sit 
down  in  peace  and  quietness,  to  attend  to  the  business  of  cor- 
respondence and  friendship"  (p.  368). 

"I  look  upon  my  scheme  of  embeUishing  my  farm  as  the  only 
lucky  one  I  ever  pursued  in  my  life"  (p.  268). 

"I  have  three  or  four  more  of  these  superb  visits  to  make 
and  which  I  may  not  omit  without  giving  real  offense.  To  Lord 
Plymouth  next  week;  Lord  Stamford's  the  week  after;  then, 
to  Lord  Lyttleton  at  our  Admiral's;  and  then  to  Lord  Foley" 
(p.  341). 

A  man  who  writes  thus  is  plainly  in  retirement  not  against 
his  will,  but  in  accordance  with  his  will  and  with  his  tastes.  "  After 
a  certain  time  of  life,"  writes  Graves,  "I  do  not  think  that  any 
consideration  would  have  bribed  him  to  live  away  from  the  Lea- 
sowes" {Recollections,  p.  136).  But  perhaps  Gray  had  in  mind 
also,  two  passages  which  have  led  some  biographers  to  look  upon 
Shenstone  as  a  man  disappointed  in  Ufe  and  throughout  life,  to 
say,  as  does  Hugh  Miller,  with  the  inevitable  echo  of  Gray,  "Poor 
Shenstone!  Never,  as  we  may  see  from  his  letters,  was  there 
a  man  who  enjoyed  lifeless"  {First  Impressions  of  England  and 
Its  People,  p.  155).  Now  there  are  only  two  passages,  I  beheve, 
which  can  possibly  be  so  construed,  even  when  taken  out  of  their 
context  and  balanced  by  none  of  the  passages  of  contentment. 
The  first  was  written  1741,  only  a  year  or  two  after  he  had  come 
into  possession  of  the  Leasowes: 

"Every  little  uneasiness  is  sufficient  to  introduce  my  whole 
train  of  melancholy  considerations,  and  to  make  me  utterly  dis- 
satisfied with  the  life  I  now  lead  and  the  Ufe  which  I  foresee  I 
shall  lead.  I  am  angry,  and  envious,  and  dejected,  and  frantic, 
and  disregard  all  present  things,  just  as  becomes  a  madman  to  do. 


26  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

I  am  infinitely  pleased  (though  it  is  a  gloomy  joy)  with  the  appli- 
cation of  Dr.  Swift's  complaint,  'that  he  is  forced  to  die  in  a  rage, 
like  a  poisoned  rat  in  a  hole.'  My  soul  is  no  more  suited  to  the 
figure  I  make  than  a  cable  rope  to  a  cambric  needle:  I  cannot 
bear  to  see  the  advantages  alienated  which  I  think  I  could  deserve 
and  relish  so  much  more  than  those  that  have  them.  Nothing 
can  give  me  patience  but  the  soothing  sympathy  of  a  friend,  and 
that  will  only  turn  my  rage  into  simple  melancholy.  I  believe 
soon  I  shall  bear  to  see  nobody.  I  do  hate  all  hereabouts  already, 
except  one  or  two.  I  will  have  my  dinner  brought  upon  my  table 
in  my  absence,  and  the  plates  fetched  away  in  my  absence;  and 
nobody  shall  see  me;  for  I  can  never  bear  to  appear  in  the  same 
stupid  mediocrity  for  years  together,  and  gain  no  ground  .  .  . 
Not  that  all  I  say  here  will  signify  to  you;  I  am  only  under  a  fit 
of  dissatisfaction,  and  to  grumble  does  me  good — only  excuse 
me,  that  I  cure  myself  at  your  expense"  (Works,  III,  pp.  44-45). 

Hugh  Miller  ends  his  cjuotation  with  Swift's  words  and  seri- 
ously calls  the  whole  "a  frightful  confession"  {First  Impressions, 
p.  156).  He  pays  no  heed  to  the  playful  close,  which  shows  that 
the  whole  is  only  a  fit  of  dissatisfaction,  and  that  the  dissatisfied 
man  is  curing  himself  by  pouring  out  the  passing  feeling  to  his 
trusted  and  understanding  friend.  Are  the  persons  who  have 
had  like  hours  of  discontent  with  everything  in  life  so  few  that 
such  feelings  should  call  forth  special  notice?  Are  they  all  un- 
happy and  disappointed  men?  How  many,  then,  are  the  ordi- 
narily happy  men?  And  does  a  man  say  that  he  is  "angry,  and 
envious,  and  dejected,  and  frantic"  when  he  is  so  in  truth,  when 
the  feelings  are  deeper  than  the  surface?  Mr.  Mumby,  quoting 
this  letter  in  his  collection,  has  the  common  sense  to  entitle  it 
"A  Good  Grumble. "  He  quotes,  too,  another  letter  of  Shenstone, 
that  in  which  he  writes,  "I  find  no  small  delight  in  rearing  all  sorts 
of  poultry.  ...  As  I  said  before,  one  may  easily  habituate 
one's  self  to  cheap  amusements;  that  is,  rural  ones  (for  all  town 
amusements  are  horridly  expensive);  I  would  have  you  cultivate 
your  garden,  plant  flowers  .  .  .  write  now  and  then  a  song,  buy 
now  and  then  a  book,  write  now  and  then  a  letter"  iyVorks,  III, 
p.    160). 

That  he  was  thoroughly  discontented  it  is  impossible  to  believe 
when  we  read  this  and  other  passages.     He  wrote : 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  27 

"You  cannot  think  how  much  you  gratified  my  vanity  when 
you  were  here  by  saying  that  if  this  place  were  yours,  you  thought 
you  should  be  less  able  to  keep  within  the  bounds  of  economy 
than  myself.  God  knows  it  is  pain  and  grief  to  me  to  observe 
her  rules  at  all;  and  rigidly  I  never  can.  How  is  it  possible  to 
possess  improvable  scenes,  and  not  wish  to  improve  them?  And 
how  is  it  possible,  with  economy,  to  be  at  the  expense  of  improving 
them  upon  my  fortune?  To  be  continually  in  fear  of  excess  in 
perfecting  every  trifling  design,  how  irksome!  to  be  restrained 
from  attempting  any,  how  vexatious!  So  that  I  never  can  enjoy 
my  situation,  that  is  certain.  Economy,  that  invidious  old 
matron!  on  occasion  of  every  frivolous  expense  makes  such  a 
hellish  squalling  that  the  murmur  of  a  cascade  is  utterly  lost  to 
me"  (p.  192). 

But  this  is  not  overwhelmingly  serious,  and  he  wrote  also, 
"I  almost  hate  the  idea  of  wealthiness  as  much  as  the  word.  It 
seems  to  me  to  carry  a  notion  of  fulness,  stagnation,  and  insigni- 
ficancy" (p.  137).  To  be  sure,  he  wrote  in  1741,  "Probably 
enough  I  shall  never  meet  with  a  larger  share  of  happiness  than 
I  feel  at  present.  If  not,  I  am  thoroughly  convinced  my  pain  is 
greatly  superior  to  my  pleasure."  But  he  added  in  a  moment, 
"I  do  not  know  how  I  am  launched  out  so  far  into  this  complaint; 
it  is  perhaps  a  strain  of  constitutional  whining.  ...  I  will  be 
as  happy  as  my  fortune  will  permit,  and  will  make  others  so  .  .  . 
I   will   be   so"    (pp.    59-60). 

He  distresses  his  biographers  by  writing  to  Mr.  Graves  in  1746: 
"I  have  lost  my  road  to  happiness,  I  confess;  and,  instead  of 
pursuing  the  way  to  the  fine  lawns  and  venerable  oaks  which 
distinguish  the  region  of  it,  I  am  got  into  the  pitiful  parterre- 
garden  of  amusement,  and  view  the  nobler  scenes  at  a  distance. 
I  think  I  can  see  the  road,  too,  that  leads  the  better  way,  and  can 
show  it  to  others;  but  I  have  many  miles  to  measure  back  before 
I  can  get  into  it  myself,  and  no  kind  of  resolution  to  take  a  single 
step"   (pp.   161-162). 

But  when,  as  often,  he  was  in  ill  health,  he  wrote  as  follows: 

"I  am  in  as  good  spirits  this  instant  as  ever  I  was  in  my  life; 

only  'Mens  turbidum  laetatur.'     My  head  is  a  little  confused; 

but  I  often  think  seriously  that  I  ought  to  have  the  most  ardent 


28  ^\^LLIAM  shenstone  and  his  critics 

and  practical  gratitude  (as  the  Methodists  choose  to  express 
themselves)  for  the  advantages  that  I  have;  which,  though  not 
eminently  shining,  are  such,  to  speak  the  truth,  as  suit  my  parti- 
cular humor,  and  therefore  deserve  all  kind  of  acknowledgment. 
If  a  poet  should  address  himself  to  God  Almighty  with  the  most 
earnest  thanlvs  for  his  goodness  in  allotting  him  an  estate  that 
was  overrun  with  shrubs,  thickets,  and  coppices,  variegated  with 
barren  rocks  and  precipices,  or  floated  three  parts  in  four  with  lakes 
and  marshes,  rather  than  such  an  equal  and  fertile  spot  as  'the 
sons  of  men'  delight  in,  to  my  apprehension  he  would  be  guilty 
of  no  absurdity.  But  of  this  I  have  composed  a  kind  of  prayer, 
and  intend  to  write  a  little  speculation  on  the  subject.  This 
kind  of  gratitude  I  assuredly  ought  to  have  and  have"  (p.  91). 

In  his  essays  he  pens  these  well-weighed  lines: 

"We  are  oftentimes  in  suspense  betwixt  the  choice  of  dif- 
ferent pursuits.  We  choose  one  at  last  doubtingly  and  with  an 
unconquered  hankering  after  the  other.  We  find  the  scheme  which 
we  have  chosen  answers  our  expectations  but  indifferently — most 
worldly  projects  will.  We  therefore  repent  of  our  choice,  and 
immediately  fancy  happiness  in  the  paths  which  we  decline;  and 
this  heightens  our  uneasiness.  We  might  at  least  escape  the 
aggravation  of  it.  It  is  not  improbable  we  had  been  more  un- 
happy, but  extremely  probable  we  had  not  been  less  so,  had  we 
made  a  different  decision  "  (Works,  II,  p.  245).  The  essayist  here 
touches  on  an  experience  common  to  many,  if  not  all,  human  beings. 

"I  am  miserable,"  he  wrote  comfortably  in  1745,  "conscious 
to  myself  that  I  am  too  httle  selfish;  that  I  ought  now  or  never 
to  aim  at  some  addition  to  my  fortune;  and  that  I  make  large 
advances  towards  the  common  catastrophe  of  better  poets,  pov- 
erty" (Works,  III,  p.  120).  But  he  was  not  miserable  enough 
over  his  lack  of  riches  to  set  about  increasing  his  fortune  in  a 
business-Hke  way.  Instead  he  went  on,  '*I  never  can  attend 
enough  to  some  twelve-penny  matter,  on  which  a  great  deal  de- 
pends."  Possibly  he  longed  for  a  wife's  companionship  (p.  115), 
but  the  following  words  of  his  hardly  indicate  it:  "I  have  often 
thought  those  to  be  the  most  enviable  people  whom  one  least 
envies — I  believe  married  men  are  the  happiest  that  are;  but  I 
cannot  say  I  envy  them"   (p.  64).     Of  his  friendship,  or  love 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  29 

affair,  with  the  Miss  C.  of  the  Pastoral  Ballad,  with  whom  some  of 
his  biographers  would  have  him  deeply  in  love,  he  said  to  Graves, 
"My  amour,  in  so  far  as  I  indulge  it,  gives  me  some  pleasure,  and 
no  pain  in  the  world"  (p.  120).  And  he  assured  Graves,  "Mar- 
riage was  not  once  the  subject  of  our  conversation,  nor  even  love" 
{Recollections,  p.  106). 

The  real  state  of  the  case  seems  to  be — and  in  this  he  is  truly 
the  child  of  his  time  and  of  his  Anglo-Saxon  ancestors — Shenstone 
had  in  his  poetry,  his  letters,  and  his  own  nature  a  vein  of  pensive- 
ness  and  not  uncomfortable  melancholy,  which  it  was  the  literary 
custom  of  those  days  to  express.  We  find  it  in  Parnell,  Young, 
Gray,  Akenside,  Thomson.  It  had  been  more  deeply  voiced  cen- 
turies earlier  in  the  oldest  Enghsh  lyrics.  And  Shenstone  seems 
really  to  enjoy  indulging  himself  in  the  expression  of  this  "pleasing 
melancholy. "  It  is  perhaps  inseparable  from  a  rich  vein  of  humor 
such  as  his,  a  gentle  playfulness,  which,  though  it  grew  less  after 
the  death  of  his  loved  brother,  did  not  desert  him  even  in  such 
loneliness.  Those  who  often  smile  from  the  heart,  sigh  from  the 
heart  as  well.  Shenstone  was  "fearful  of  whining"  {Works,  III, 
p.  99).  He  valued  "universal  cheerfulness"  and  called  it  "worth 
all  that  either  fortune  or  nature  can  bestow"  (pp.  241,  242).  He 
could  smile,  too,  at  his  own  sighing,  and  how  that  throws  Ught  on 
character!  "Thus,"  he  writes  in  1743,  "my  epistles  persevere 
in  the  plaintive  style;  and  I  question  whether  the  sight  of  them 
does  not,  ere  now,  give  you  the  vapors.  I  have  an  old  aunt  who 
visits  me  sometimes,  whose  conversation  is  the  perfect  counterpart 
of  them.  She  shall  fetch  a  long-winded  sigh  with  Dr.  Young  for 
a  wager;  though  I  see  his  Suspiria  are  not  yet  finished.  He  has 
relapsed  into  Night  the  Fifth''  (p.  107). 

Landscape  Gardening 

As  a  landscape  gardener,  Shenstone's  influence  was  widespread 
and  has  proved  lasting.  It  is,  I  beheve,  in  accordance  with  the 
best  practice  of  our  own  day.  He  was  among  the  first  to  grasp 
the  ideas  of  freedom,  openness,  the  "triumphs  of  the  wavmg  line," 
and  the  following  of  nature's  own  suggestions.  Furthermore,  he 
was  among  the  first  to  put  these  principles  into  practice  at  once; 
and,  though  lavish  by  nature,  he  developed,  perhaps  perforce, 


30  A\7LLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

the  talent  of  demonstrating  great  principles  and  achieving  really- 
remarkable  artistic  results  wth  small  means.  When  nature  with 
her  springing  step  is  the  guide,  when  teaching  and  practice  go 
hand  in  hand,  and  when  the  master,  seeing  that  the  work  of  his 
brain  and  hand  is  good,  shows  it  himself  with  ready  courtesy  and 
something  of  a  creator's  satisfaction  to  all  who  seek  him, — then 
indeed  we  expect  and  find  an  effective  influence. 

The  very  name  of  Shenstone's  estate,  the  Leasowes  (an  archaic 
word  for  pastures),  has  a  quaint  charm.  His  ferme  ornee,  as  he 
often  called  the  "paradise,"  which  month  by  month  and  year  by 
year  he  made  from  the  one  hundred  and  fifty  acres  of  thickets, 
swamps,  fields,  and  woodlands  left  him  by  his  father,  became  a 
model  for  people  far  and  near,  bringing  many  a  delightful  and 
delighted  guest  to  his  door,  and  teaching  a  gracious  art,  in  which 
we  are  trying  now  to  instruct  our  young  men  and  maidens. 

We  may  note  in  passing  the  words  of  Doctor  Johnson  on  this 
part  of  Shenstone's  work,  words  that  have  been  quoted  with  far 
too  great  respect: 

"Whether  to  plant  a  walk  in  undulating  curves,  and  to  place 
a  bench  at  every  turn  where  there  is  an  object  to  catch  the  view; 
to  make  the  water  run  where  it  will  be  heard,  and  stagnate  where 
it  will  be  seen;  to  leave  intervals  where  the  eye  will  be  pleased,  and 
to  thicken  the  plantation  where  there  is  something  to  be  hidden, 
demands  any  great  powers  of  mind  I  will  not  inquire;  perhaps  a 
surly  and  sullen  spectator  may  think  such  performances  the 
sport  rather  than  the  business  of  human  reason"  (Johnson:  Works, 
III,  p.  350).  What  better  appreciation  could  we  expect  from  a 
man  to  whom  one  mountain  looked  like  the  others,  and  all  were 
mere  protuberances  on  the  surface  of  the  earth?  What  he  said 
of  Shenstone  was  true  of  himself:  "He  had  no  value  for  those 
parts  of  knowledge  which  he  had  not  himself  cultivated."  Yet 
he  admits  that  such  gardening  is  "an  innocent  amusement,"  and 
that  "some  praise  must  be  allowed  by  the  most  supercilious  obser- 
ver to  him  who  does  best  what  such  multitudes  are  contending  to 
do  well." 

Shenstone  wrote  no  elaborate  or  finished  treatise  on  the  sub- 
ject, but  his  Unconnected  Thoughts  on  Gardening  enunciate  broader 
principles  and  are  more  practicable,  far  more  widely  available, 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  31 

thaa  Bacon's  famous  directions  for  the  conventional  garden  of  a 
prince,  with  all  its  sumptuousness.  Such  sayings  as  these  come 
from  the  pen  of  the  artist  of  the  Leasowes: 

"Ground  should  first  be  considered  with  an  eye  to  its  peculiar 
character;  whether  it  be  the  grand,  the  savage,  the  sprightly,  the 
melancholy,  the  horrid,  or  the  beautiful.  As  one  or  other  of  these 
characters  prevail,  one  may  somewhat  strengtlien  its  effect" 
{Works,  II,  p.   127). 

"Even  the  temper  of  the  proprietor  should  not  perhaps  be 
wholly  disregarded;  for  certain  complexions  of  soul  will  prefer 
an  orange  tree  or  a  myrtle  to  an  oak  or  a  cedar"  (p.  138). 

"In  designing  a  house  and  gardens,  it  is  happy  when  there  is 
an  opportunity  of  maintaining  a  subordination  of  parts;  the  house 
so  luckily  placed  as  to  exliibit  the  whole  design"  (p.  128). 

"The  landscape  painter  is  the  gardener's  best  designer"  (p. 
129). 

"When  a  building  or  other  object  has  once  been  viewed  from 
its  proper  point,  the  foot  should  never  travel  to  it  by  the  same 
path  which  the  eye  has  traveled  over  before.  Lose  the  object, 
and  draw  nigh  obliquely"  (p.  131). 

"The  eye  should  always  look  rather  down  upon  water;  cus- 
tomary nature  makes  this  requisite"  (p.  130). 

"Water  should  ever  appear  as  an  irregular  lake  or  a  winding 
stream"  (p.  141). 

"Apparent  art  in  its  proper  province  is  almost  as  important 
as  apparent  nature.  They  contrast  agreeably,  but  their  provinces 
should   ever   be   kept    distinct"    (p.    135). 

"The  shape  of  ground,  the  site  of  trees,  and  the  fall  of  water 
are  nature's  province.     Wliatever  thwarts  her  is  treason"  (p.  136). 

"Art,  indeed,  is  often  requisite  to  collect  and  epitomize  the 
beauties  of  nature,  but  should  never  be  allowed  to  set  her  mark 
upon    them"    (p.    142). 

Shenstone's  use  of  urns  and  small  obeUsks  and  of  inscriptions 
dedicating  seats  or  summer-houses,  was  a  passing  fancy  of  the  age, 
but  such  maxims  are  lasting. 

His  advice  was  sought  by  many  landed  proprietors  in  beauti- 
fying their  estates.  His  ideas  were  quoted  with  respect  and  were 
adopted  or  developed  by  other  writers  on  the  same  subject — by 


32  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

WTieatley  in  his  treatise  on  Modern  Gardening,  by  Mason  in  his 
long  didactic  poem,  The  English  Garden,  by  the  Marquis  of  Ermen- 
onville  in  his  treatise  on  The  Means  of  improving  the  Country 
round  our  Habitations  {Recollections,  p.  64),  by  Pindemonte,  who 
traced  the  taste  of  Enghsh  gardening  to  Shenstone  {Curiosities 
of  Literature,  p.  97).  A  set  of  his  works  is  kept  in  the  landscape 
gardening  department  of  the  Boston  Public  Library.  The  Leasowes 
inspired  Abbotsford.  Scott  writes  in  one  of  his  prefaces,  "  I  can  trace 
even  to  childhood  a  pleasure  derived  from  Dodsley's  account  of 
Shenstone's  Leasowes;  and  I  envied  the  poet  much  more  for  the 
pleasure  of  accomplishing  the  objects  detailed  in  his  friend's  sketch 
of  his  grounds  than  for  the  possession  of  pipe,  crook,  flock,  and 
PhiUis  to  boot"   (Quoted  in  Miller:  First  Impressions,    p.   121). 

In  this  connection  it  is  worth  while  to  notice  the  short  essay 
introducing  the  selections  from  Shenstone  in  Warner's  Library 
of  the  WorWs  Best  Literature  (vol.  23,  pp.  13305-7).  The  writer, 
whose  name  is  not  given,  derives  most  of  his  material,  in  addition 
to  the  inevitable  quotations  from  Johnson  and  Gray,  from  Tucker- 
man's  chapter  on  the  Z>//£'/to«te,  and  derives  it,  with  no  acknowledg- 
ment, by  the  path  of  bungling  plagiarism.  His  only  originahty 
lies  in  his  inaccuracy,  his  attempted  humor,  and  a  vexatious 
assumption  of  doing  justice,  while  he  is  in  reality  most  unjust. 
The  opening  sentence  shows  the  method  of  using  material.  Tucker- 
man   begins: 

"A  friend  of  mind  recently  purchased  at  auction  an  old  copy 
of  Shenstone.  It  is  illustrated  with  a  portrait  and  frontispiece 
representing  some  kind  of  aquatic  bird  peering  up  from  among 
the  reeds  by  the  side  of  a  little  waterfall." 

The    later    writer    begins    thus: 

"Turning  over  the  pages  of  a  certain  eighteenth-century  annual, 
the  reader  comes  upon  a  brown  and  yellow  engraving  of  a  land- 
scape garden:  of  walks  in  undulating  curves,  miniature  lakes, 
little  white  cascades,  Greek  temples,  pines  and  cypresses  cut  in 
grotesque  shapes.  Aquatic  birds  peer  from  out  the  reeds,  and 
doves   flutter   in    the    trees." 

Now  the  "brown  and  yellow  engraving"  does  not  show  nearly 
all  the  objects  seen  there  by  this  ready  writer.  No  pine  or  cypress 
is  there,  and  all  the  trees  have  their  natural  grace  of  form,  as  might 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  33 

be  expected  from  the  pains  Shenstone  took  with  this  picture  of 
his  grove.  Not  a  tree  cut  in  a  grotesque  shape  is  there  or  was 
ever  on  Shenstone's  grounds.  That  is  an  artificial  practice  against 
which  he  specifically  protests.  ''Why  fantastically  endeavor," 
he  exclaims,  "to  humanize  those  vegetables  of  which  nature, 
discreet  nature,  thought  it  proper  to  make  trees?  "  {Works,  II,  p. 
149).  Surely  it  is  unwise  to  write  a  critical  estimate  of  an  author 
with  an  important  part  of  whose  works  the  writer  is  wholly  un- 
acquainted. 

The  beauty  of  the  Leasowes,  even  though  perishing  from  the 
neglect  or  destructive  bad  taste  of  following  inartistic  owners, 
attracted  such  visitors  as  Goldsmith,  Hugh  Miller,  and  Words- 
worth. Even  as  lately  as  1905,  Mr.  W.  H.  Hutton  of  Oxford  found 
great  interest  in  visiting  the  spot,  although  only  a  few  groups  of 
Shenstone's  groves  and  "hanging  woods"  of  firs,  elms,  or  beeches 
remained.  Neglected  and  overgrown  as  they  are,  says  this  twen- 
tieth-century guest,  the  acres  of  the  Leasowes  show  "as  do  few 
other  places  in  England,  how  in  the  beginnings  of  the  art,  the 
principles  of  landscape  gardening  were  developed"  (Burford 
Papers,   p.    186). 

Poetry 

It  is  hard  to  separate  Shenstone's  character,  his  gardening, 
and  his  poetry,  for  each  one  is  an  essential  part  of  the  others.  The 
qualities  of  his  poetry  as  a  whole  that  most  impress  the  careful 
reader  are  simplicity;  fastidiousness  of  ear;  refinement  of  taste; 
variety  of  poetic  form;  ingrained  love  of  country  life  and  of  all 
the  beauties  of  nature  about  him  save  those  of  winter;  a  profound 
admiration  for  the  unostentatious  private  virtues,  which  are  the 
foundation  of  all  healthy  hfe,  whether  individual  or  national,  as 
opposed  to  ambition  for  court  favor  and  glaring  fame;  and,  despite 
much  lifelessness  of  conventional  phrasing,  sincerity  of  feeUng 
"in  an  age  when  feeling  was  none  too  common"  (Ward:  The 
English  Poets,  p.  272).  Take  away  the  stereotyped  pastoral  phras- 
ing from  Shenstone's  poetry,  and  a  large  part  of  his  artificiality 
disappears;  take  away  still  other  fetters  of  convention,  and  the  real 
feeling  still  remains.  He  does  not  stir  our  hearts  deeply,  but  he 
does  touch  them  in  reality.  At  his  best  we  find  also,  as  in  the 
Pastoral  Ballad,  great  deUcacy  of  artistic  perception  and  touch; 


34  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

or,  as  in  The  Schoolmistress,  an  easy  picturesqueness,  a  warm 
sympathy  in  characterization,  and  a  gentle  humor,  which  recall 
in    some    measure    tlie    master-artist    Chaucer. 

Certain  supercilious  words  concerning  our  poet  challenge  our 
attention.  They  have  so  long  been  credited  to  Gray  and  quoted 
as  his  that,  although  it  now  seems  probable  from  my  investigations 
that  they  were  really  a  forgery  of  his  friend  Mason's,  they  should 
be  discussed  here. 

"There  is  Mr.  Shenstone,  who  trusts  to  nature  and  simple 
sentiment;  Why  does  he  do  no  better?  He  goes  hopping  along 
his  own  gravel  walks,  and  never  deviates  from  the  beaten  paths 
for  fear  of  being  lost"^  (Gray:  Poems,  with  memoirs  of  his  life 
and  writings  by  Mason,  p.  261).  "This  remark,"  says  Anderson, 
"was  made  in  connection  with  Shenstone's  pieces  in  the  last  two 
volumes  of  Dodsley's  Co//frf/ow  "  {Poets  of  Great  Britain,  IX,  p.  261). 
It  is  only  fair  to  note  that  his  poems  in  these  two  volumes  were 
published  while  he  lay  ill  of  a  fever,  and  that  Dodsley's  friendly 
intentions  were  better  than  his  judgment.  "  I  had  been  mortified, " 
writes  Shenstone,  "by  the  first  sight  of  what  was  done.  To  speak 
the  truth,  there  are  many  things  appear  there  contrary  to  my 
intentions;  but  which  I  am  more  desirous  may  be  attributed  to 

the  unseasonableness  of  my  fever   than   to  my  friend  D 's 

precipitation.  .  .  .  The  verses  in  the  sixth  volume  (which  was 
printed  before  the  fifth)  were  printed  without  my  knovvledge; 
and  when  I  sent  up  an  improved  copy,  it  arrived  a  good  deal  too 

^  In  Mason's  edition  of  Gray  (1775)  these  sentences  appear  in  a  letter 
(Letter  30)  from  Gray  to  Dr.  Wharton  dated  from  Cambridge,  March  8,  1758. 
No  sucli  letter  is  printed  in  Gosse's  edition  (1885)  or  even  in  that  of  Mitford 
(1816).     Gosse  writes  as  follows  of  Mason's  methods: — 

"He  did  not  know  what  it  was  to  be  scrupulous  in  approaching  a  patron 
or  in  handling  a  text.  With  laim  the  end  justified  the  means,  and  he  t'nought 
no  more  of  confuting  a  rascally  enemy  by  introducing  a  forged  paragraph  into 
a  letter  than  he  did  of  completing  an  unfinished  stanza  or  of  suppressing  a 
clumsy  sentence.  His  version  of  Gray's  Letters  is  crowded  with  alterations, 
interpolations,  and  transpositions.  ...  I  have  compared  Mason's  text  again 
and  again  with  Gray's  actual  holograph,  and  have  experienced  a  sort  of  amaze- 
ment at  the  impudence  that  the  collation  reveals.  ...  I  have  ventured  to 
expunge  these  and  other  forgeries  altogether,  when  it  is  quite  certain  that  they 
were  introduced  by  Mason,  and  I  have  not  cared  to  disturb  the  reader  by  any 
current  reference  to  them"  (Gray:  Works,  edited  by  Gosse,  pp.  xi-xii). 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  35 

late.  ...  As  things  happen,  I  am  made  to  own  several  things 
of  inferior  merit  to  those  which  I  do  not  own.  All  this  is  against 
me;  but  my  thoughts  are  avocated  from  this  edition  and  wholly 
fixed  upon  a  future,  wherein  I  hope  Dodsley  may  be  prevailed 
upon  to  omit  some  things  also  from  other  hands  which  discredit 
his  collection"  (Works,  III,  pp.  313-314). 

True,  there  is  only  a  httle  originality  and  much  that  is  con- 
ventional in  the  poem.s  here  considered;  but  the  emotions  are  real 
and  natural,  the  love  of  nature  is  unmistakable,  and  there  are 
many  passages  whose  poetic  perception  of  the  beauty  in  common 
country  things  and  whose  flowing  melody  have  still  an  almost 
haunting  charm.  Mr.  W.  H.  Hutton  admires,  as  many  have  done 
and  still  do,  "that  sensitive,  dehcate  touch"  in  Hope  of  the  Pas- 
toral Ballad,  and  quotes  the  stanza: 

My  banks  they  are  furnished  with  bees, 

Whose  murmur  invites  one  to  sleep; 
My  grottos  are  shaded  with  trees, 

And  my  hills  are  white  over  with  sheep. 
I  seldom  have  met  with  a  loss, 

Such  health  do  my  fountains  bestow, 
My  fountains  all  bordered  with  moss, 
Where  the  harebells  and  violets  grow. 
"It  sounds  easy  enough,"  he  adds,  "but  really  the  tunefulness 
of  it  is  inimitable"  (Burford  Papers,  pp.  182-183). 

Mr.  Saintsbury  says  that  these  same  Hnes  "and  a  few  other 
such  things  obstinately  recur  to  the  memory  and  assert  that  their 
author  was  after  all  a  poet.  ...  In  the  Spenserian  stanza  he 
is  commendable.  .  .  .  His  anapests  are  much  more  original.  .  .  . 
Shenstone  taught  this  metre  [anapestic  trimeter]  to  a  greater  poet 
than  himself,  Cowper,  and  these  two  between  them  have  written 
almost  everything  worth  reading  in  it,  if  we  put  avowed  parody 
and  burlesque  out  of  the  question"  (Ward:  The  English  Poets, 
p.  272). 

Feeling  in  The  Dying  Kid  and  Ode  to  Memory  is  tender  and 
true,  despite  artificial  expression.  At  least  one  passage  has  vivid 
picturesqueness  of  detail,  as  the  poet,  tired  of  ambitious  years, 
exclaims : 

Oh,  from  my  breast  that  season  rase, 

And  bring  my  childhood  in  its  place; 
Bring  me  the  bells,  the  rattle  bring, 
And  bring  the  hobby  I  bestrode, 


36  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

\Mien  pleased  in  many  a  sportive  ring 
Around  the  room  I  jovial  rode. 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  Il7)t 
Rural  Elegance,  published  in  this  volume  of  Dodsley's  Collection, 
shows  true  delight  in 

All  Nature's  charms  immense,  and  heaven's  unbounded 

love. 
And  Oh,  the  transport  most  alhed  to  song, 


To  catch  soft  hints  from  Nature's  tongue 

And  bid  Arcadia  bloom  around; 
Whether  we  fringe  the  sloping  hill. 

Or  smooth  below  the  verdant  mead, 
Or  in  the  horrid  bramble's  room 
Bid  careless  groups  of  roses  bloom, 
Or  let  some  sheltered  lake  serene 
Reflect  clouds,  woods,  and  spires,  and  brighten 
all  the  scene. 

{Poetical  Works,  pp.  129-130) 

He  has  seen  with  pleasure  the  swain  at  evening 
Speed  whistling  home  across  the  plain, 

(p.  130) 

and  has  noted 

^  The  tangled  vetch's  purple  bloom, 

The  fragrance  of  the  bean's  perfume. 

(p.  132) 
He  exclaims  with  deUght, 

I  breathe  fresh  gales  o'er  furrowed  ground. 

(p.  105) 

Before  Bryant,  before  Wordsworth,  he  calls  out  to  men, 
With  Nature  here  high  converse  hold. 

(p.  132) 
Did  Nature  ever  betray  the  heart  that  loved  her?    Moreover, 
was  it  not  along  one  of  Shenstone's  own  "gravel  walks"  that 
Gray  himself  walked  safely  to  widespread  and  lasting  fame  when 
he  wrote  the  Elegy  in  a  Country  Churchyard? 

After  the  fashion  of  their  day,  Shenstone's  poems  are  classified 
by  his  pubUsher.  The  four  groups  are:  Elegies;  Odes,  Songs, 
Ballads,  etc.;  Levities,  or  Pieces  of  Humor;  Moral  Pieces.  Per- 
haps I  may  well  follow  the  example  of  his  most  dogmatic  and 
injurious  critic.  Dr.  Johnson,  in  considering  the  groups  in  this 
order,  and  may  well  consider  at  the  same  time  his  criticisms  upon 

t  All  references  to  Poetical  Works  are  to  Gilfillan's  edition. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  37 

them  (Johnson:  Works,  III,  pp.  335-359).  Now  Johnson's  sayings 
against  men  either  greater  or  less  than  Shenstone  have  by  no  means 
passed  unquestioned,  despite  the  energy  with  which  they  were 
expressed  and  the  firm  hold  which  they  took  on  the  public  mind. 
Cowper  wrote,  "I  am  convinced  .  .  .  that  he  has  no  ear  for 
poetical  numbers,  or  that  it  was  stopped,  by  prejudice,  against 
the  harmony  of  Milton's"  {Life  of  Cowper;  Private  Correspondence, 
edited  by  Grimshawe,  I,  p.  139).  No  doubt  there  are  numbers 
who  have  shared  and  who  share  to  this  day  the  earnest  indignation 
of  Sir  Egerton  Brydges:  "For  fifty  years  I  have  had  an  un- 
quenchable desire  to  refute  Dr.  Johnson's  perverse  criticisms  and 
malignant  obloquies"  (Life  of  Milton,  p.  99).  Says  Dugald  Stew- 
art, "How  wayward  and  perverse  in  many  instances  are  his 
decisions  when  he  sits  in  judgment  on  a  political  adversary,  or 
when  he  treads  on  the  ashes  of  a  departed  rival"  (Stewart:  Works, 
IV,  p.  362).  Johnson  was  "the  most  unpoetical  of  critics." 
Perhaps  he  was  also  the  most  unfit;  but  was  there  ever  anything 
on  the  whole  round  earth  of  which  he  felt  himself  in  the  least 
incompetent  to  judge?  It  is  amusing  to  see  the  uncouth  man, 
too  short-sighted  to  see  or  care  for  a  landscape,  too  coarse  of  fibre 
to  recognize  dehcacy  of  feeling,  too  dull  of  ear  to  hear  and  enjoy 
the  melody  of  lyric  verse,  too  unhappy  in  sohtude  ever  to  endure  it, 
too  obtusely  serious  to  perceive  any  humor  but  the  most  lumber- 
ingly  laborious, — to  see  this  oracle  advance  pompously  to  sit  in 
judgment  on  Shenstone,  the  fastidious  in  taste,  the  loving  admirer 
of  every  beauty  in  nature,  the  man  of  refined  and  tender  feeling, 
the  poet  of  sweet  and  graceful  melodies,  the  recluse  happy  in  his 
rural  quiet,  the  humorist  whose  fine  playfulness  brightens  so 
many  of  his  pages. 

Of  the  Elegies  Johnson  says  that  they  "suit  not  ill"  to  the 
author's  conception  of  Elegy,  which  he  has  in  his  preface  "very 
discriminately  and  judiciously  explained"  as  "the  effusion  of  a 
contemplative  mind,  sometimes  plaintive  and  always  serious 
and  therefore  superior  to  the  ghtter  of  slight  ornaments."  "His 
thoughts  are  pure  and  simple."  Johnson  says  further  that  the 
Elegies  lack  variety,  and  that  they  have  too  much  resemblance 
one  to  another.  This  is  true  in  large  measure,  but  it  is  sameness 
of  mood  and  form  rather  than  of  subject  that  we  find.  One  should 
hardly  read  the  twenty-six  at  a  sitting.    The  range  of  theme 


216758 


58  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

includes  praise  of  simplicity,  the  language  of  birds,  brave  deeds 
of  historic  ancestors,  complaint  against  Fortune,  a  recantation 
of  the  complaint,  a  shepherd's  lament  over  British  manufacture 
of  woolens,  the  folly  of  superciUousness,  the  patriotism  of  the 
ancient  Britons,  and  violation  of  the  rights  of  sepulture,  as  well 
as  the  more  usual  themes  of  love  and  death.  There  is  warm  love 
of  native  land  expressed  m  the  fourteenth,  in  which  he  declines 
an  invitation  to  visit  foreign  countries;  the  sketch  of  the  girlish 
maniac  on  the  plam  is  touching  (Elegy  XVI);  and  the  tale  of 
Jessy  is  told  with  a  degree  of  real  pathos  (Elegy  XXVI).  These 
are,  no  doubt,  the  qualities  that  led  the  youthful  Burns  to  call 
Shenstone  "that  celebrated  poet  whose  divine  elegies  do  honor 
to  our  language,  our  nation,  and  our  species"  (Burns:  Works, 
II,  p.  ii.  Preface  to  Original  Kilmarnock  Edition). 

As  to  the  diction,  it  is  often  and  often  affected,  but  that  "it 
is  often  harsh  and  improper;  that  the  words  are  ill-coined  or  ill- 
chosen;  and  his  phrases  unskilfully  inverted,"  is  an  over-statement 
with  which  Johnson  contrives  to  stamp  the  whole  as  worthless. 
It  is  with  pleasure  that  we  note  again  Shenstone's  observant  love 
of  nature  in  such  Unes  as  these: 

Where  the  wild  thyme  perfumes  the  purpled  heath, 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  41) 

I  steal  the  musk-rose  from  the  scented  brake, 

(p.  40) 

Pleased  if  the  glowing  landscape  wave  with  corn, 

(p.  50) 
or  the  simple  strength  of  noble  thought  in  the  following: 

The  sire,  in  place  of  titles,  wealth,  or  power, 

Assigned  him  virtue;  and  his  lot  was  fair, 

(p.  31) 

Farewell !  the  virtues  wliich  deserve  to  live 

Deserve  an  ampler  bliss  than  life  bestows, 

(p.  32) 
or  the  vivid  descriptive  touch  and  stately  music  of  these: 

From  a  lone  tower  with  reverend  ivy  crowned, 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  29) 

And  hoary  Memphis  boasts  her  tombs  alone, 

The  mournful  types  of  mighty  power  decayed. 

(p.  28) 
It  is  not  enough  to  say  with  Johnson,  "The  lines  are  sometimes, 
such  as  Elegy  requires,  smooth  and  easy." 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  39 

Of  the  Odes,  Songs,  and  Ballads  we  may  accept  Johnson's 
saying  that  Shenstone's  "lyric  poems  are  almost  all  of  the  light 
and  airy  kind,  such  as  trip  lightly  and  nimbly  along,  without  the 
load  of  any  weighty  meaning."  That  such  a  weight  would  give 
them  the  wings  of  inspired  poesy,  we  cannot  believe.  Rural 
Elegance  is  exempted  from  the  Doctor's  general  criticism  because 
he  has  "  once  heard  it  praised  by  a  very  learned  lady, "  and  because, 
in  spite  of  the  irregularity  of  line  so  obnoxious  to  his  methodical 
nature,  it  contains  "philosophic  argument  and  poetic  spirit." 
It  is  not  only  this  very  irregularity,  but  the  wholesome  delight 
in  nature,  the  loving  intimacy  with  her  lesser  graces,  and  the  ap- 
preciation of  her  uplifting  power  through  close  friendship, — it  is 
all  this  that  gives  us  pleasure  in  the  poems  although  the  plain  is 
still  "painted"  by  the  flowers,  as  in  the  hues  of  Pope.  That  none 
of  the  other  lyrics  are,  on  the  whole,  "excellent"  we  may  agree. 
Shenstone  wrote  to  Dodsley  of  his  own  songs,  "The  reason  there 
are  so  many  is  that  I  wanted  to  write  one  good  song,  and  could 
never  please  myself"  {Works,  I,  p.  VI).  Still,  Nancy  of  the  Vale 
and  the  unpublished  Valentine's  Day  in  the  manuscript  are  graceful 
and  sweet,  and  there  is  fresh  music  and  fresh  feeling  in  the  lament 
of   imprisoned    Princess   Elizabeth: 

Peers  can  no  such  charms  discover 

All  in  stars  and  garters  drest, 
As  on  Sundays  does  the  lover, 

With  his  nosegay  on  his  breast. 

Hark  to  yonder  milkmaid  singing 

Cheerily  o'er  the  brimming  pail. 
Cowslips  all  around  are  springing, 

Sweetly  paint  the  golden  vale. 

Never  yet  did  courtly  maiden 

Move  so  sprightly,  look  so  fair; 
Never  breast  with  jewels  laden 

Pour  a  song  so  void  of  care. 

Would  indulgent  Heaven  had  granted 

Me  some  rural  damsel's  part! 
All  the  empire  I  had  wanted 

Then  had  been  my  shepherd's  heart. 


None  had  envied  me  when  living, 

None  had  triumphed  o'er  my  tomb. 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  158) 


40  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Dr.  Johnson  had  the  prevailing  eighteenth  century  idea  that 
all  excellence  and  greatness  belong  exclusively  to  dwellers  in  cities 
and  are  never  developed  in  quiet  rural  life.  We  feel  like  saying 
to  him,  in  Shenstone's  lines  that  foreshadow  Wordsworth's  touch 
and  heart: 

Learn  to  relish  calm  delight, 

Verdant  fields  and  fountains  bright, 

Trees  that  nod  o'er  sloping  liills. 

Caves  that  echo  tinkling  rills. 

If  thou  canst  no  charm  disclose 
In  the  simplest  bud  that  blows, 
Go,  forsake  thy  plain  and  fold; 
Join  the  crowd,  and  toil  for  gold. 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  275) 

The  four  parts  of  the  Pastoral  Ballad,  says  Johnson,  deserve 
particular  notice,  and  he  gives  it.  Yet  his  commendation  of  one 
passage  as  deserving  sympathy  from  every  mind  that  has  any  ac- 
quaintance with  love  or  nature,  of  another  passage  as  having  "pret- 
tiness, "  and  of  a  third  as  mentioning  "the  commonplaces  of 
amorous  poetry  with  some  address,"  is  more  than  overbalanced 
by  his  opening  blunt  remark  that  he  regrets  it  is  pastoral,  that 
"an  intelUgent  reader  sickens  at  the  mention  of  the  crook,  the 
pipe,  the  sheep,  and  the  kids,  which  it  is  not  necesfary  to  bring 
forward  to  notice,  for  the  poet's  art  is  selection,  and  he  ought  to 
show  the  beauties  without  the  grossness  of  a  country  life. "  These 
words  reveal  the  critic's  nature.  Pastoral  mechanism  does  become 
wearisome  truly,  when  we  read  page  after  page  without  inspiration; 
but  in  the  stanzas  of  this  poem  it  seems  perfectly  at  home.  It  is 
such  an  essential  part  of  the  landscape  (which,  to  be  sure,  Johnson 
did  not  care  for)  that  we  should  no  more  wish  it  away  than  we 
should  wish  away  the  green  EngHsh  grass,  the  "pinks  in  a  morn," 
and  the  "eglantine  after  a  shower."  After  all,  the  shepherd's 
life  is  real;  and  Shenstone  well  knew  that  life  and  the  poetic  beauty 
of  its  surroundings.  The  ballad  hardly  contains  the  experience 
written  in  heart's  blood  that  some  few  have  found  in  it,  but  it  is 
a  harmonious  and  exquisitely  deUcate  expression  of  true,  though 
not  profound,  heart  experience  It  is  "emotion  recollected  in 
tranquility. " 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  41 

Shenstone's  friends  of  the  present  day  would  probably  be  as 
well  pleased  if  most  of  his  Levities  had  not  been  printed.  He 
himself  would  very  likely  have  been  better  pleased,  as  we  may 
understand  from  the  pains  he  took  to  collect  and  destroy  copies 
of  his  early  anonymous  volume  of  1737  {Curiosities  of  Literature, 
III,  p.  96,  note),  and  from  the  words  of  Bishop  Percy:  "Among 
Shenstone's  Levities  and  Songs  are  many  which  he  himself  sorely 
regretted  to  me  had  ever  been  committed  to  the  press.  But  when 
Dodsley  was  printing  that  volume  of  his  Miscellanies  in  which 
they  first  appeared,  Mr.  Shenstone  lay  ill  of  a  fever,  and,  being 
unable  to  make  any  selection,  ordered  his  whole  portfolio  to  be 
sent  to  him,  relying  on  his  care  to  make  a  proper  choice  of  what 
were  fit  to  be  pubhshed;  but  he  intruded  the  whole  into  his  volume, 
and  afterwards  used  that  as  a  plea  for  inserting  them  in  his  Works  " 
(Nichols:  Illustrations,  VII,  p.  152).  Yet  Johnson's  charge 
that  "his  humor  is  sometimes  gross  and  seldom  sprightly"  we 
cannot  admit.  Colemira,  a  Culinary  Eclogue,  has  merit  and  is 
a  not  unpleasing  satire  on  the  pastoral  love  poem.  It  has  an  added 
interest  in  showing  how  Shenstone  could  laugh  at  one  of  his  omi 
chosen  forms  of  poetry.  The  Poet  and  the  Dun  is  a  respectable 
version  of  a  standard  literary  joke.  The  charge  of  grossness  does 
not  apply  save  to  a  part  of  The  Charms  of  Precedence  with  its  tale 
of  scandal.  The  second  half  of  this  poem  Shenstone  would  very 
likely  have  suppressed;  the  first  half  deserves  to  Uve  for  its  witty 
touches,  and  has  nothing  to  shock  even  the  moral  Johnson.  The 
lament  of  Slender's  Ghost  over  "Sweet  Anne  Page,"  so  easily 
and  so  happily  expressed,  and  the  lines  written  at  an  inn  at  Henley, 
we  could  ill  spare.  Suggested  by  love  of  Shakespeare,  they  have 
a  touch  of  Shakespeare's  spirit  in  their  human  way  of  smihng  and 
sighing  at  the  same  moment,  and  making  the  reader  share  both 
feelings.  Dr.  Johnson  himself,  so  Boswell  tells  us,  repeated  the 
lines  "with  great  emotion"  when  they  were  dining  together  at  an 
excellent  inn  at  Chapel-house: 

Whoe'er  has  traveled  Hfe's  dull  round, 
Where'er  his  stages  may  have  been, 

May  sigh  to  think  he  still  has  found 
His  warmest  welcome  at  an  inn. 
Boswell  adds,  "My  illustrious  friend,  I  thought,  did  not  sufficiently 
admire  Shenstone"  {Life  of  Johnson,  II,  p.  452). 


42  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Of  the  Moral  Pieces,  it  is  only  the  two  that  are  rhymed  that 
Johnson  thinks  worthy  of  notice.  Love  and  Honor  he  likes 
"well  enough  to  wash  it  were  in  rhyme."  It  is  a  relief  to  the 
modern  reader  that  it  is  not,  although  the  heroic  couplets  of  The 
Judgment  of  Hercules  are  pleasing  enough.  To  quote  Johnson 
again,  "The  nimibers  are  smooth,  the  diction  elegant,  and  the 
thought  just. "  The  Doctor's  contempt  for  the  blank  verse  of 
Shenstone  is  a  part  of  his  unreasoning  contempt  for  all  poetry  of 
that  form:  "His  blank  verses  those  that  can  read  them  may 
probably  find  to  be  like  the  blank  verses  of  his  neighbors. "  Cer- 
tainly it  is  not  in  such  verse  that  Shens tone's  gifts  shine;  he  is 
not  great  enough  for  it.  Written  without  genius,  but  carefully 
and  with  some  freedom,  skill,  and  taste,  his  poems  of  this  form 
are  pleasant  on  tlie  first  reading,  but  one  is  ready  to  wait  some 
time  for  the  second.  Yet  here  again,  Shenstone  shows,  or  almost 
leads,  the  taste  and  tendency  of  his  time  towards  variety  of  form 
and  towards  occasional  use  of  richer,  statelier  harmonies  than 
those  of  ever-recurring  rhyme.  Milton's  influence  was  making 
itself  felt  against   Pope's. 

It  is  small  wonder  that  Johnson  knows  not  what  claim  The 
Schoolmistress  has  to  stand  among  the  moral  works,  although 
Anderson  justifyingly  remarks  that  "it  abounds  with  .  .  .  serious 
instruction"  (Poets  of  Great  Britain,  IX,  p.  590).  Shenstone 
meant  it  for  an  entirely  different  place,  and  it  is  hard  to  understand 
how  Dodsley  could  make  so  stupid  a  blunder  in  classification  when 
he  must  have  had  at  hand  the  edition  of  1742,  which  he  had  himself 
published.  There  it  is  printed  with  the  author's  entertaining 
'Ludicrous  Index,"  which  is  filled  with  the  same  sustained  play- 
fulness as  the  poem  itself  and  was  written,  as  the  author  says  in 
his  letters,  "purely  to  show  (fools)  that  I  am  in  jest"  (Works,  III, 
p.  69).  It  is  an  agreeable  addition  to  the  poem,  but  was  apparently 
not  matter  of  fact  enough  to  enhghten  Dodsley,  and  might  not 
have  pierced  Johnson's  density.  Following  in  their  train,  many 
readers  have  entirely  mistaken  the  poet's  tone.  Would  that  the 
gift  to  perceive  and  enjoy  the  more  dehcate  forms  of  jesting  might 
be  more  widely  spread,  and  so  broaden  and  refine  the  Hterary  joys 
of  all  Doctor  Johnson's  ilk!  Would  that  it  might  be  required  as  a 
qualification  for  every  critic  who  is  to  be  regarded  as  competent 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  43 

and  authoritative!  As  it  is,  Shenstone,  of  finer  perceptions,  had 
good  reason  to  complain  {Works,  III,  p.  69). 

"The  Schoolmistress  is  surely  the  most  pleasing  of  Shenstone's 
performances,"  says  Johnson,  yet  it  is  only  intellectual  pleasure 
that  he  finds  in  it.  "We  are  entertained  at  once  with  two  imita- 
tions, of  nature  in  the  sentiments,  of  the  original  author  in  the 
style;  and  between  them  the  mind  is  kept  in  perpetual  employment. " 
He  cares  not  for  the  genial  humor,  the  winning  youthfuJness  of 
spirit,  the  warm,  lowly,  homelike  comfort  playing  through  and 
around  the  whole.  He  does  not  hear  the  easy  yet  skilful  melody. 
The  scores  of  deft  touches  given  by  Shenstone's  ready  imagination 
as  he  sketches  "learning's  Httle  tenement,"  "the  dame  disguised 
in  look  profound  "  wearing  her  russet  kirtle  ("Twas  simple  russet, 
but  it  was  her  own"),  the  children  "in  gaping  wonderment," 
"the  weakly  wights  of  smaller  size,"  her  garden  with  "marygold 
of  cheerful  hue"  and  lavender  with  "pikes  of  azure  bloom," 
her  elbow-chair,  her  friendly  hen,  and  her  ginger-bread, — all 
these  find  no  imagination  in  the  lexicographer's  heart  to  start  in 
ready    response. 

Written  avowedly  as  an  imitation,  this  poem  has  lived  for 
its  originaUty.  Gray  may  well  say  that  it  is  "excellent  of  its  kind 
and  masterly"  (Gray:  Works,  edited  by  Gosse,  TI,  p.  219). 
Mr.  Otto  Daniel's  doctoral  thesis  emphasized  its  value  as  one  of 
the  earliest  pioneer  works  in  a  special  literary  form,  the  lesser 
epic  (Kleinepos),  in  which  Goldsmith's  Deserted  Village,  Goethe's 
Hermann  und  Dorothea,  Wordworth's  best  poetic  narratives,  and 
finally  Tennyson's  Enoch  Arden  are  prominent.  He  make?  a  de- 
tailed study  of  the  three  editions  of  the  poem  (1737,  1742,  1773) 
in  regard  to  the  literary  forerunners  and  traditions  to  which 
Shenstone  allied  himself,  the  scope  of  his  originality,  his  faithful- 
ness to  the  principles  of  poetry  that  he  had  himself  enunciated 
in  his  essays  and  letters — especially  simplicity  and  variety — and 
his  influence  on  his  successors.  As  models  and  traditions  familiar 
to  Shenstone  and  giving  him  inspiration  for  The  Schoolmistress, 
he  cites  Ovid,  Chaucer,  Spenser,  Milton,  Rochester,  Parnell,  Pope, 
Ramsay,  Prior,  Gay,  ballads,  versions  of  the  Psalms  (pp.  12,  35). 
He  notes  the  important  fact  that  for  his  ideals  of  taste  and  genius 
Shenstone    turned    away    from    the    French     influence     so    long 


44  ^VILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

predominant  in  England  (p.  20).  Humor  is  duly  pointed  out. 
The  literary  pedigree  of  the  dame's  "one  ancient  hen"  is  traced 
faithfully  back  through  the  refractory  fowl  In  the  middle  of  the 
road  shown  in  the  picture  of  the  Hales-Owen  school-house  {Gen- 
tleman's Magazine,  luKV,  p.  905),  Thomson's  "careful  hen,"  the 
solitar}''  cat  owned  by  Mause  in  The  Gentle  Shepherd,  the  hens 
mentioned  with  dogs  and  swine  in  Pope's  Alley,  Chaucer's  Chaun- 
tecleer  and  Pertelote,  to  the  single  goose  guarding  the  farmyard 
of  the  classic  Baucis  (pp.  63-64).  A  long  procession  of  school- 
mistresses and  schoolmasters  in  literature  is  made  to  file  before 
us  in  impressive,  though  not  splendid,  array,  until  the  type  is 
well-nigh   exhausted    (pp.    86-93). ' 

Mr.  Daniel  seems  hardly  to  appreciate  the  finer  type  of  hu- 
morous imitation,  of  which  this  poem  seems  to  me  a  master-piece, 
the  high  standard  for  burlesque  set  by  Shenstone  in  both  theory 
and  practice  (Works,  III,  pp.  61,  70).  Hv.  places  The  Schoolmis- 
tress beside  Pope's  vulgar  Alley  (Daniel,  p.  25).  Moreover,  he 
seems,  like  Johnson,  not  to  perceive  the  deftness  of  descriptive 
touch,  the  musical  grace,  the  atmosphere  of  familiar  comfort, 
the  boyish  freshness  and  genial  sympathy  with  both  age  and 
childhood,   which   pervade   the    whole.     He  pays   little   heed   to 

Her  apron  dyed  in  grain  as  blue,  I  trow, 

As  is  the  harebell  that  adorns  the  field, 

(stanza  6) 
to  her  well-disciplined  schoolroom. 

Where  comely  Peace  of  Mind  and  Order  dwell, 

(stanza  7) 
to  the  herbs 

That  in  her  garden  sipped  the  silvery  dew, 

(stanza  11) 

And  pungent  radish,  biting  infant's  tongue, 

(stanza  19) 

to  the  feelings  of  the  small  offender,  who  after  the  whipping 
Abhorreth  laench,  and  stool,  and  fourm,  and  chair, 
And  deems  it  shame  if  he  to  peace  incline, 

(stanzas  24,  26) 

to  the  village  shop,  where  is  to  be  found 

The  gooseb'rie  clad  in  livery  red  or  green, 
And  here  of  lovely  dye  the  Catherine  pear, 

(stanza  33) 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  45 

and  to  the  cherries,  which 

draw  little  eyes  aside, 
And  must  be  bought  though  penury  betide. 

(stanza  34) 

Still,  in  its  conclusion  reached  by  thorough  work,  it  is  a  valuable 
contribution    to    the    worth    of    Shenstone's   poem: 

"Durch  das  Zusammenspiel  von  Shenstone's  litterarischen 
Vorgangern  und  seinen  eigenen  kritischen  Ansichten,  entwickelte 
sich  die  Schilderung  des  Kleinlebens,  die  friiher  nur  als  Episode 
in  grosseren  epischen  Zusammenhangen  begegnete,  zu  selbst- 
standiger  Form.  Es  entstand  dadurch  eine  neue  Gattung:  kurze 
Verserzahlungen  von  kleinen  Leuten  im  gewohnlichen  Leben. 
Man  karmdiese  Gattung  als  Kleinepos  bezeichnen  "  (Daniel,  p.  78). 

Johnson's    closing    estimate    is    as    follows: 

"The  general  recommendation  of  Shenstone  is  easiness  and 
simplicity;  his  general  defect  is  want  of  comprehension  and  variety. 
Had  his  mind  been  better  stored  with  kiiowledge,  whether  he  could 
have  been  great,  I  know  not;  he  could  certainly  have  been  agree- 
able. " 

The  last  sentence  makes  null  and  void  even  the  slight  praise 
that  had  gone  before.  The  judge  hands  down  his  decision  on  Shen- 
stone's poetry  with  an  air  of  absolute  finality:  "inferior  and 
disagreeable."  This  decision  has  persisted  and  spread  like  a 
noxious  weed.  Thus,  as  D'Israeli  truthfully  says,  "the  dogmatism 
of  Johnson  and  the  fastidiousness  of  Gray  .  .  .  have  fatally  in- 
jured a  fine  genius  in  Shenstone"  {Curiosities  of  Literature,  III,  p.  90). 
The  friends  of  Shenstone  lay  no  claim  to  greatness  in  his  behalf; 
that  greater  stores  of  learning  would  have  made  his  poetry  great 
only  a  pedant  believes.  But  that  he  is  a  true  and  agreeable  poet 
cannot  well  be  denied  by  the  unprejudiced  critic.  That  he  has 
genuine  originahty,  living,  though  neither  profound  nor  of  wide 
scope,  and  that  he  has  had  positive  influence  on  the  growth  of  our 
literature,  should  be  openly  declared,  and  spread  as  widely  as 
the  unjust  censure  of  his  ponderous  critic. 

Traces  of  Shenstone's  influence  upon  other  and  greater  poets 
are  not  hard  to  iind,  and  have  been  pointed  out  by  D'Israeli, 
Gilfillan,  and  Daniel.  I  must  content  myself  with  indicating  a 
few.     The  influence  of  The  Schoolmistress  is  seen  and  felt  plainly 


46  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

in  The  Cotter^s  Saturday  Night,  which  has  the  same  form,  the  like 
richness  of  homely  detail,  and  the  same  warmly  sympathetic  feeling 
that  springs  from  having  been  a  part  of  the  life  portrayed.  The 
tone  is  not  playful;  the  spirit  is  earnest;  yet,  on  the  whole,  Burns 
has  here  done  for  lowly  rural  home  h'fe  what  Shenstone  did  earher 
•for  lowly  rural  school  life.  Goldsmith's  village  schoolmaster,  of 
whom 

still  the  wonder  grew 
That  one  small  head  could  carry  all  he  knew, 

reminds  one  irresistibly  of  Shenstone's  ancient  dame  and  of  her 
pupils,    who 

think,  no  doubt,  she  been  the  greatest  wight  on  ground. 

One  portrait  is  a  companion-piece  to  the  other.  In  his  elegies 
Shenstone  helped  to  set  the  metrical  form,  the  tone  of  "pleasing 
melancholy"  without  grief,  and  the  wide  range  of  pensiveness  for 
Gray's  far  greater  work.  In  Gray's  Elegy,  too,  we  find  more 
specific  traces  of  Shenstone.  Before  the  former  wrote  of  the 
"village  Hampden"  and  "some  mute,  inglorious  Milton,"  the 
latter  had   shown 

A  little  bench  of  heedless  bishops  here, 

And  there  a  chancellor  in  embryo, 

Or  bard  sublime,  if  bard  may  e'er  be  so, 
As  Milton,  Shakespeare,  names  that  ne'er  shall  die. 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  270) 

Every  one  recalls  the  perfect  lines 

Full  many  a  rose  is  born  to  blush  unseen 
And  waste  its  sweetness  on  the  desert  air, 

but  few  know  the  similar  lines  of  Shenstone: 

WTiy  has  such  worth  without  distinction  died? 
Why,  like  the  desert's  lily,  bloomed  to  fade? 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  8) 

and 

WTiat  is,  unknown,  the  poet's  skill? 


Or  what  the  rose's  blush  unseen? 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  180) 
Shenstone's  lines, 

If  thou  canst  no  charm  disclose 
In  the  simplest  bud  that  blows, 

foreshadowed   the   far   richer   thought   of   Wordsworth: 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  47 

To  me  the  meanest  flower  that  blows  can  bring 
Thoughts  that  do  often  lie  too  deep  for  tears. 

{hitimations  of  Immortality) 

The    desire    of    the    town-dweller 

Midst  all  the  city's  artful  trim 

To  rear  some  breathless,  vapid  flowers, 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  133) 

is  reproduced  by  Cowper  in  The  Task  (Book  IV,  1.  750).     It  may 
not  be  a  mere  fancy  of  mine  that  the  lines 
I  have  found  out  a  gift  for  my  fair, 

I  have  found  where  the  wood-pigeons  breed, 
{Poetical  Works,  p.  152) 

suggested  to  Mrs.  Browning  the  dainty  romance  of  Httle  Ellie 
sitting  by  the  brookside  in  the  grass,  and  thinking  in  her  dream 
of  happiness: 

I  will  have  a  lover, 
Riding  on  a  steed  of  steeds; 
He  shall  love  me  without  guile. 
And  to  him  I  will  discover 

The  swan's  nest  among  the  reeds. 
{Romance  of  the  Swan's  Nest,  stanza  4) 

Emerson  wrote: 

"Miller  owns  this  field,  Locke  that,  and  Manning  the  woodland 
beyond.  But  none  of  them  owns  the  landscape.  There  is  a  prop- 
erty in  the  horizon  which  no  man  has  but  he  whose  eye  can  integrate 
all  the  parts,  that  is,  the  poet.  This  is  the  best  part  of  these 
men's  farms,  yet  to  this  their  warranty  deeds  give  no  title." 

(Works,  I,  p.  8). 

This   thought  was  spoken  earlier  by  Shenstone,   who,   after 

sketching  the  anxious  care  of  the  wealthy  land  owner  to  secure 

his  claim  for  ages  by  bonds  and  contracts,  says  of  the  muse  that 

her  unreversed  decree. 
More  comprehensive  and  more  free. 
Her  lavish  charter,  taste,  appropriates  all  we  see. 

{Poetical  Works,  p.  128) 

Essays 

Although  Shenstone  is  best  known  as  a  poet,  yet  he  has  un- 
questionably greater  originality  as  a  critic  of  literature  and  of 
life.  Dodsley  was  right  long  ago  in  saying,  "His  character  as  a 
man  of  clear  judgment  and  deep  penetration  will  best  appear  from 


48  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

his  prose  works"  (Works,  I,  p.  vii).  Of  hi?  Essays  on  A  fen  and 
Manners  I  am  tempted  to  write  at  great  le.igth.  That  would  be 
necessary  in  order  to  treat  the  theme  satisfactorily,  for  it  seems 
to  me  of  ample  interest  and  value  for  an  entire  thesis.  It  must 
be  dismissed  here  in  merely  a  few  paragraphs. 

In  easy  grace,  friendUness  of  manner,  quiet  humor,  good  sense, 
literary  interest,  and  moral  wholesomeness,  many  of  these  essays 
remind  the  reader  of  Addison's,  though  not  as  imitations.  This 
is  true  oi  An  Impromptu,  A  Vision,  the  first  and  s  cond  Character, 
A  Humorist,  QXid  An  Adventure.  One  or  two,  such  as  Reserve  and 
the  paragraph  on  the  pleasure  of  paying  one's  debts  [Works,  II, 
p.  161),  have  a  touch  of  Bacon's  compact  comprehensiveness.  In 
range  of  subject  we  are  again  reminded  of  the  Spectator,  for  we 
find  speculations  on  publications,  dress,  ghosts,  hypocrisy,  religion, 
taste,  gardening,  politics,  books  and  writers,  and  card  playing. 
The  reader  does  not  easily  forget  the  man  (really  Shenstone  himself) 
who  is  overheard  at  his  devotions  giving  thanks  that  his  name  is 
"liable  to  no  pun,"  that  it  "runs  chiefly  upon  vowels  and  liquids," 
that  he  can  laugh  at  his  own  folhes,  foibles,  and  infirmities,  and 
does  not  lack  infirmities  to  employ  this  disposition  {Works,  II,  pp. 
23,  24).  Nor  doss  one  forget  the  distinction  between  the  gentleman 
f/e /ac/o  and  the  gentleman  c?ej?We;  the  tale  of  the  spider  which  had 
enslaved  the  world  and  of  the  ant  which  obstructed  that  design; 
the  allegory  of  the  soul  who  forsook  her  guide,  the  matron  Reason, 
to  be  led  through  life  by  the  beautiful  young  Passions;  the  parti- 
culars concerning  the  Most  Powerful  Order  of  Beauties  to  be  estab- 
lished for  the  ladies;  the  "artificial  laughter"  to  be  used  by  the 
modest  man  who  would  otherwise  be  laughed  down  by  the  im- 
pudent; the  charming  Character  meant  to  delineate  Richard  Graves 
at  Oxford;  and  the  suggestion  that  dress  should  be  according 
to  merit,  that  "a  man  should  not  wear  a  French  dress  till  he  could 
give  an  account  of  the  best  French  authors,  and  should  be  versed 
in  all  the  oriental  language?  before  he  should  presume  to  wear 
a  diamond"    (Works,  II,    p.    61). 

The  essays  are  short;  some  are  unfinished;  and  many  pages 
are  filled  with  unconnected  paragraphs  or  yet  briefer  aphorisms. 
It  is  remarkable  that  a  man  who  had  mingled  so  little  with  others 
and  who  lived  so  secluded  a  life  should  understand  human  nature, 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  49 

its  varieties  and  its  idiosyncrasies  so  well.  Some  of  his  sayings 
are  timely  even  now: 

"If  national  reflections  are  unjust  because  there  are  good  men 
in  all  nations,  are  not  national  wars  upon  much  the  same  footing?  " 
{Works,  II,  p.    148) 

"To  endeavor  all  one's  days  to  fortify  our  minds  wth  learning 
and  philosophy  is  to  spend  so  much  in  armor  that  one  has  nothing 
left    to   defend"    (p.    198). 

"There  are  many  modes  of  dress  v/hich  the  world  esteems 
handsome  which  are  by  no  means  calculated  to  show  the  human 
figure    to    advantage"    (p.    165). 

"I  fancy  the  proper  means  of  increasing  the  love  we  bear  our 
native  country  is  to  reside  some  time  in  a  foreign  one"  (p.  148). 

"Not  Hebrew,  Arabic,  Syriac,  Coptic,  nor  even  the  Chinese 
language,  seems  half  so  difficult  to  me  as  the  language  of  refusal" 
(p.  158). 

"When  a  gentlemen  oft'ers  me  cards,  I  shall  esteem  it  as  his 
private  opinion  that  I  have  neither  sense  nor  fancy"    (p.  78). 

Shenstone's  diction  is  pure  and  generally  natural,  having 
withal  sufficient  dignity.  His  sentences  are  lucid,  well-turned, 
varied,  often  epigrammatic,  preserving  the  skilful  prose  structure 
of  the  preceding  generation.  His  aphorisms  tempt  one  to  quote 
by    the    score.     I    give   a    few: 

"If  any  one's  curse  can  effect  damnation,  it  is  not  that  of  the 
pope,  but  that  of  the  poor"  {Works,  II,  p.  236). 

"The  works  of  a  person  that  builds  begin  immediately  to  decay, 
while  those  of  him  who  plants  begin  directly  to  improve"  (p.  137). 

"Dress,  like  writmg,  should  never  appear  the  effect  of  too 
much  study  and  application"  (p.  164). 

"Laws  are  generally  found  to  be  nets  of  such  texture  as  the 
little  creep  through,  the  great  break  through,  and  the  middle- 
sized  are  alone  entangled   in"    (p.    151). 

"Necessity  may  be  the  mother  of  lucrative  invention,  but  is 
the  death  of  poetical"    (p.    195). 

"A  courtier's  dependent  is  a  beggar's  dog"  (p.  148). 

"Avarice  is  the  most  opposite  of  all  characters  to  that  of  God 
Almighty,  whose  alone  it  is  to  give  and  not  receive"  (p.  230). 


50  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Letters 

Of  Shenstone's  correspondence  three  volumes  have  been 
published:  Letters  to  Particular  Friends;  Hull's  Select  Letters 
between  the  late  Duchess  of  Somerset,  Lady  Luxborough,  Miss 
Dolman,  Mr.  Whistler,  Mr.  R.  Dodsley,  William  Shenstone,  and 
others;  and  his  correspondence  with  Thomas  Percy.  An  undated 
letter  of  his  was  bought  at  a  sale  ia  London  within  a  few  years  by 
Mr.  Hutton,  who  prints  it  in  his  Burford  Papers,  saying  it  has 
been  hitherto  unprinted  (p.  187).  DTsraeli,  however,  quoted 
somewhat  freely  from  it  as  from  the  second  volume  of  Hull's 
collection  {Curiosities  of  Literature,  III,  p.  99).  A  letter  of  special 
interest,  written  by  Shenstone  to  Mr.  MacGowan  in  1761  and 
printed  at  length  ia  the  Edinburgh  Annual  Register  of  1809,  is 
given  in  Nichols'  Illustrations,  VII,  p.  220.  Of  Shenstone's  long 
correspondence  with  Lady  Luxborough,  only  her  own  contribu- 
tion has  been  published.  In  1862  his  correspondence  with  John 
Scott  Hylton  was  in  the  possession  of  E.  Jesse  {Once  a  Week,  VI). 
Dr.  Hecht  states  that  there  are  among  the  manuscripts  of  the 
British  Museum  letters  of  his  to  Lady  Luxborough,  Hylton,  and 
Robert  Dodsley,  the  leading  publisher  of  his  time  {Percy-S hen- 
stone,  p.  xvi).  The  destruction  of  his  letters  to  Whistler  by  the 
latter's  unsympathetic  surviving  brother,  Shenstone  deeply 
regretted,  as  he  considered  them  among  his  best  productions 
{Works,  III,  p.  269). 

Hull's  collection  I  have  not  succeeded  in  finding  in  the  libraries 
of  this  country,  and  a  few  years  ago  Mr.  Hutton  had  difficulty 
in  obtaining  it  in  England  {Burford  Papers).  Of  the  intimate 
letters,  written,  as  their  author  said  to  Jago,  "as  often  as  I  feel  a 
violent  propensity  to  describe  the  notable  incidents  of  my  life, 
which  amount  to  about  as  much  as  the  tinsel  of  your  little  boy's 
hobby-horse"  (Works,  III,  p.  157),  I  have  quoted  enough  in  an 
earlier   section   to  show   their   revelations  of  character. 

In  this  connection,  again  Gray  makes  an  inconsiderate  and 
unreasonable  charge:  "His  correspondence  is  about  nothing 
else  but  his  place,  and  his  own  writings,  with  two  or  three  neigh- 
boring clergymen  who  wrote  verses  too"  (Gray:  Works,  III, 
p.   344). 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  51 

Gray's  charge  is  repeated  and  amplified  by  Mr.  GilfiUan,  who 
writes  thus:  "His  Letters  are  filled  with  the  httle  complaints, 
the  little  gratifications,  the  Httle  journeys,  the  Httle  studies,  and 
the  Httle  criticisms,  of  one  whom  indolence  and  rustication  had 
reduced  to  a  little  man.  They  are,  however,  lively  and  agreeably 
written,  although  not  quite  free  from  afifectation.  .  .  .  The 
worst  thing  in  Shenstone's  correspondence  is  a  small  querulousness, 
which  sends  a  jarring  undertone  through  all  its  otherwise  amusing 
pages.  His  very  misery  is  of  Lilliputian  stature"  (Shenstone: 
Poetical  Works,  edited  by  Gilfillan,  p.  xix). 

Neither  of  these  accusers  knew  anything  of  Shenstone's  letters 
to  Percy,  which  were  not  published  until  1909.  They  write  only 
from  the  perusal  of  his  Letters  to  Particular  Friends.  Of  these, 
nearly  all  are  written  to  the  two  most  intimate  friends  he  ever  had. 
Graves  and  Jago.  To  them  he  pours  out  his  passing  moods,  his 
changing  interests,  his  daily  occupations.  He  had  no  wife,  no 
sister,  no  one  in  his  household  with  whom  he  could  talk  thus  freely 
(his  only  brother,  Joseph,  Hved  at  Bridgenorth),  and  every  human 
being  must  talk  of  these  little  commonplaces  to  some  one,  now 
and  then.  His  cascades,  his  carnations,  his  murmuring  streams, 
gave  him  real  pleasure;  and  his  loving  care  of  them  he  delighted  to 
share,  as  well  as  his  sadness  when  winter  blighted  his  garden.  It: 
is  only  a  dwarfed  nature  that  finds  no  beauty  and  pleasure  in  small 
things.  Moreover,  Shenstone  seriously  approved  of  egotism  in 
letters  {Works,  HI,  p.  241).  Particular  friends  certainly  wish  to 
know  of  the  things  large  and  small  that  go  to  make  up  their  friend's 
Hfe.  Why  should  not  Shenstone  talk  of  his  changes  in  The  School- 
mistress, of  his  designs  for  its  second  edition,  of  his  verses  to  Venus, 
of  his  Pastoral  Ballad,  as  freely  as  Lowell  does  of  his  volume.  The 
Nooning,  and  of  the  metre  in  his  noble  Commemmoration  Ode? 
Why  should  he  not  talk  to  his  friends  of  his  headaches  and  fevers, 
as  does  poHshed  Walpole  of  his  gout  and  his  "bootikin"  to  the 
Countess  of  Ossory?  Why  should  he  not  talk  of  the  Leasowes  as 
Scott  does  of  the  improvements  at  Abbotsford  {Letters  to  Mr. 
Polwhele,  September,  November,  1812)?  Another  prince  of 
letter-writers,  Cowper,  dwells  freely  on  his  own  states  of  mind, 
his  poetry,  his  little  studies,  and  his  potted  plants.  But  as  to 
Shenstone's  writing  of  nothing  else,  what  shall  we  say  when  page 


52  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

after  page  shows  his  vnde  and  keen  Hterary  interest?  He  writes 
a  delightfully  amusing  letter  in  the  style  of  Pamela  {Works,  III, 
pp.  4-6);  he  speaks  of  Thomson  as  "that  sweet-souled  bard" 
(p.  138);  he  criticizes  the  Castle  of  Indolence  for  omissions,  while 
admiring  it  as  an  imitation  of  Spenser  (p.  174);  he  has  received 
Voltaire's  new  tragedy  from  London,  and  speaks  of  his  amusement 
in  reading  the  Lettres  de  Madame  dc  Maintenon  (p.  239);  he  finds 
the  reading  of  Clarissa  Harloive  "threatens  to  grow  extremely 
tedious,"  as  he  saunters  about  his  grounds,  thinking  the  author 
might  be  "less  prolix,"  though  he  is  a  "man  of  genius  and  nice 
observation"  (p.  188);  he  criticises  Gibber  and  other  actors  (pp. 
28,  74) ;  he  lends  a  Life  of  Socrates  (p.  188) ;  he  tires  of  Parson  Adams 
(p.  81);  he  is  "now  like  the  rest  of  the  world,  perusing  Sir  Charles 
Grandison,"  whose  author  "wants  the  art  of  abridgement  in  every- 
thing he  write?"  (p.  258);  he  alludes  often  to  Shakespeare  and  his 
favorite  Falstaflf  (pp.  92,  93,  224);  he  finds  Thomas  Warton's 
inscriptions  "too  simple  even  for  my  taste"  (p.  322);  he  advises, 
"Pray  read  Madame  de  Sevigne's  Letters,"  and,  "Of  all  books 
whatever,  read  Burke  (second  edition)  Of  the  Sublime  and  Beautiful" 
(p.  337);  he  says,  "Rasselas  has  a  few  refined  sentiments  thinly 

scattered,  but  is,  upon  the  whole,  below  Mr.  J "   (p.  340); 

he  mentions  (p.  363)  Percy's  Reliques;  he  writes  of  Robinson's 
History  (p.  372),  of  Hull's  Rosamond  (p.  373),  of  Gerard  on  Taste 
(p.  342);  he  thinks  The  Dunciad  "flat  in  the  whole"  (p.  37);  he 
finds  entertainment  in  Hogarth's  Analysis  of  Beauty  (p.  260); 
he  designs  illustrations  for  Pamela  (p.  4);  he  is  deeply  interested 
in  a  new  and  beautiful  edition  of  Horace  with  its  scholarly  text 
and  well-executed  frontispiece  (pp.  378,  381);  he  gives  his  estimate 
of  Handel's  music  in  the  Messiah  (pp.  318-319).  And  so  I  might 
go  on,  but  I  will  pause  with  remarks  of  his  on  three  of  his  critics. 
"Mr.  Walpole  is  a  lively  and  ingenious  writer;  not  always  ac- 
curate in  his  determinations,  and  much  less  so  in  his  language; 
too  often  led  away  by  a  desire  of  routing  prejudices  and  destroying 
giants.  ...  He  has  with  great  labor,  in  his  Book  of  Painters, 
recorded  matters  of  little  importance  relative  to  people  that  were 
of  less.  I  have  a  right  to  be  severe  [as  usual,  a  glint  of  playfulness], 
for  his  volumes  cost  me  above  thirty  shillings;  yet,  where  he  drops 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  53 

the  antiquarian  in  them,  his  remarks  are  striking  and  worth  peru- 
sal"   (Works,  III,  pp.   381,   382). 

"I  have  lately  been  reading  one  or  two  volumes  of  The  Rambler; 
who,  excepting  against  some  few  hardnesses  in  his  manner  and 
the  want  of  more  examples  to  enliven,  is  one  of  the  most  nervous, 
most  perspicuous,  most  concise,  and  most  harmonious  prose- 
writers  I  know.  A  learned  diction  improves  by  time"  (Works, 
III,  pp.  353-354). 

"Mr.  Gray,  of  manners  very  delicate,  yet  possessed  of  a  poetical 
vein  fraught  with  the  noblest  and  sublimest  images,  and  a  mind 
fraught  with  the  more  mascuUne  parts  of  learning"  (Works,  II, 
p.   289). 

In  this  connection,  we  may  well  note  Shenstone's  modesty 
and  hesitation  about  publishing  his  own  works.  He  would  be 
"sorry  to  obtrude  stuff"  upon  the  world,  "either  from  the  pencil 
or  the  pen"  (Works,  III,  p.  331),  and  he  hesitates  about  publishing 
his  collected  works  by  subscription,  lest,  even  if  they  are  embel- 
Ushed  with  top  and  tail  pieces  and  views  from  his  farm  "in  an 
elegant  manner, "  this  method  may  be  a  trifle  disreputable  (Works, 
III,  pp.  370,  371;  Percy-Shenstone,  pp.  69-71).  Such  a  thing  he 
hopes  to  avert  by  advertising  that  "unless  a  certain  number  were 
subscribed  for,  the  whole  affair  should  be  no  farther  prosecuted" 
(Works,  III,  p.  371). 

The  letters  to  Percy,  all  written  in  Shenstone's  riper  years, 
have  the  same  qualities — unfailing  courtesy,  warm  friendship, 
ease  and  variety  of  expression,  fondness  for  a  good  joke  or  anecdote, 
love  of  home,  interest  in  all  things  artistic  or  literary;  but  the  pro- 
portion of  the  personal  is  much  smaller  than  in  those  to  Graves  and 
Jago,  that  of  literary  discussion  much  larger.  The  pages  abound 
with  critical  comment,  thoughtful  suggestion,  good  practical 
sense,  fineness  of  taste,  genial  breadth  of  spirit,  wide  learning, 
and  keen  understanding  of  the  tendencies  of  the  time.  The 
small  talk  is  full  of  easy  grace.  How  Httle  did  Gray  and  Johnson 
understand  this  man!  We  sliould  like  to  confront  them  with 
these  letters,  which  have  a  charm  like  Lowell's  and  Cowper's.  For- 
tunate indeed  it  is  for  the  student  of  Enghsh  literature  that  they 
are  now  accessible.  My  chief  consideration  of  them  belongs, 
however,    in    the   next   section. 


54  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Literary  Criticism 

Shenstone  wrote  no  systematic  or  complete  treatise  on  litera- 
ture or  on  the  principles  of  literary  criticism.  The  short,  interest- 
ing essay  on  Elegy  is  his  only  comprehensive  treatment  of  even 
any  small  portion  of  the  field  of  letters.  For  the  rest,  his  ideas 
are  to  be  found  in  his  correspondence,  and  in  the  pages  on  Books  and 
Writers  which  are  in  the  volume  of  essays.  I  have  already  quoted 
from  the  Letters  to  Particular  Friends  many  opinions  on  specific 
literary  matters  of  his  day,  and  they  abound  in  his  pages  to  Percy. 
The  two  exchange  their  manuscript  verses  and  inscriptions  for 
opinions  and  suggestions  {Percy-Shenstone,  pp.  10,  13,  64,  65); 
they  exchange  new  books,  for,  in  his  winter  seclusion,  Shenstone 
declares,  "I  hunger  more  for  a  six-penny  pamphlet  than  I  do  for 
the  freshest  barrel  of  oysters"  (p.  91);  each  in  turn  urges  the  other 
to  visit  him,  as  "  there  will  indeed  be  no  end  of  writing  all  we  have 
to  say"  (p.  43);  they  consider  in  detail  the  pubUcation  of  Shen- 
stone's  works  by  subscription,  and  Percy  strongly  advises  it 
(pp.  69-71).  Shenstone  urges  Percy  to  read  the  Prolusions,  Ancient 
Fragments  of  Erse  Poetry,  and  Webb's  treatise  On  Painting.  He 
discusses  matter  for  a  "ludicrous  essay"  on  false  taste,  and  declares, 
in  connection  with  Mr.  Spence's  history  of  such  taste,  "I  do  not 
expect  any  great  matter  from  a  subject  of  humor  in  my  friend's 
hands"  (p.  41).  The  work  of  the  well-known  Birmingham  printer, 
Baskerville,  receives  both  admiration  and  censure  (pp.  41,  59,  84), 
and  Shenstone  declares  that  "well-judged  and  elegant  wooden 
tail -pieces  are  an  ornament  much  wanting  to  every  press  in  Europe" 
(p.  66).  He  has  been  reading  "the  Edinburgh  Homer,  a  Miscel- 
lany of  Allan  Ramsay's,  Scotch  Proverbs,  Scotch  Ballads"  until, 
he  declares,  "I  am  grown  almost  a  Scotchman"  (p.  12).  Of 
Webb's  Essay  on  Poetry,  he  remarks,  "He  has  something  clever" 
in  it,  "but  he  is  too  laconic  and  does  not  say  enough  for  what  his 
title  implies"  (p.  80).  Of  Dr.  Johnson  he  writes,  "I  have  a  pre- 
judice (if  prejudice  it  may  be  called)  in  favor  of  all  he  undertakes, 
and  wish  the  world  may  recompense  him  for  a  degree  of  industry 
very  seldom  connected  with  so  much  real  genius"  (p.  7).  His 
opinion  of  Collins'  Oriental  Eclogues  is  this:  "The  Orientals  fur- 
nished a  new  and  very  fertile  subject  for  eclogues.     Poor  Collins 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  .  55 

did  not  wholly  satisfy  me,  having  by  no  means  sufficiently  availed 
himself  of  their  many  local  peculiarities"  (p.  31).  The  translation 
of  Madame  de  Sevigne's  Letters  which  fell  in  his  way  he  finds  "is 
very  inaccurate  yet  somewhat  spirited;  seems  the  hasty  production 
of  some  Frenchman  by  no  means  void  of  genius"  (p.  26). 

Shenstone  discusses,  also,  older  and  greater  authors.  Vergil 
gives  him  "excessive  pleasure,  beyond  any  other  writer,  by  uxiiting 
the  most  perfect  harmony  of  metre  with  the  most  pleasing  ideas 
or  images"  (p.  200).  "I  have  sometimes  thought  Vergil  so  re- 
markably musical  that,  were  his  lines  read  to  a  musician  wholly 
ignorant  of  the  language,  by  a  person  of  capacity  to  give  each 
word  its  proper  accent,  he  would  not  fail  to  distinguish  in  it,  all  the 
graces  of  harmony"  (p.  270).  Of  Spenser's  Fairy  Queen  Shenstone 
writes:  "The plan  appears  to  me  very  imperfect.  His  imagination, 
though  very  extensive,  yet  somewhat  less  so,  perhaps,  than  is 
generally  allowed,  if  one  considers  the  facihty  of  realizing  and 
equipping  forth  the  virtues  and  vices.  .  .  .  Much  art  and  judg- 
ment are  discovered  in  parts,  and  but  little  in  the  whole.  One 
may  entertain  some  doubt  whether  the  perusal  of  his  monstrous 
descriptions  be  not  as  prejudicial  to  true  taste  as  it  is  advantageous 
to  the  imagination.  Spenser,  to  be  sure,  expands  the  last,  but 
then  he  expands  it  beyond  its  true  limits"  (p.   186). 

There  is  much  of  value  in  Shenstone's  enunciation  of  general 
principles;  and  here  he  shows  the  same  taste,  breadth,  and  penetra- 
tion. Especially  does  he  emphasize  clearness,  correctness,  sim- 
plicity, and  naturalness.  He  insists  that  obscurity  is  the  reverse 
of  all  good  writing,  and  goes  so  far  as  to  wish  to  banish  enigmas 
for  this  reason  {Recollections,  p.  99).  "Nothing,"  he  declares, 
"tends  so  much  to  produce  drunkemiess  and  even  madness  as 
the  frequent  use  of  parentheses  in  conversation"  {Works,  II,  p. 
201).  He  is  "a  passionate  lover  of  simplicity"  {Percy-Shenstone, 
p.  74),  and  has  tried  in  his  "correcting"  of  his  own  works  to  secure 
ease  and  simplicity  {Percy-Shenstone,  p.  74).  "Very  few  senti- 
ments are  proper  to  be  put  in  a  person's  mouth  during  the  first 
attack  of  grief.  Everything  disgusts  but  mere  simplicity,"  and 
he  cites  the  scriptural  writers  {Percy-Shenstone,  p.  194).  He  turns 
also  to  the  classics:  "The  chief  advantage  that  ancient  writers 
can  boast  over  modern  ones,  seems  owing  to  simpUcity.     Every 


56  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

noble  truth  and  sentiment  was  expressed  by  the  former  in  the 
natural  manner;  in  word  and  phrase,  simple,  perspicuous,  and 
incapable  of  improvement.  What  then  remained  for  later  writers 
but  affectation,  witticism,  and  conceit?  "  (See  also  Percy-Shenstone, 
pp.  46,  80;  Works,  II,  pp.  176,  203). 

Naturalness  in  characters  he  stresses  thus:  " Perfect  characters 
in  a  poem  make  but  little  better  figure  than  regular  hills,  perpen- 
dicular trees,  uniform  rocks,  and  level  sheets  of  water  in  the  forma- 
tion of  a  landscape.  The  reason  is,  they  are  not  natural,  and 
moreover  want  variety"  {Works,  II,  p.  184).  "One  feels  the  same 
kind  of  disgust  in  reading  Roman  history  which  one  does  in  novels, 
or  even  epic  poetry.  .  .  .  The  hero,  the  knight-errant,  and  the 
Roman  are  too  seldom  overcome"  {Works,  II,  p.  196).  He  em- 
phasizes the  same  quality  in  style.  "I  hate  a  style,  as  I  do  a  garden 
that  is  wholly  flat  and  regular;  that  slides  along  like  an  eel,  and 
never  rises  to  what  one  can  call  an  inequality"  {Works,  II,  p.  176). 
He  dislikes  "the  present  pomp  and  haughtiness  of  style"  {Percy- 
Shenstone,  p.  18),  flowery  rhetoric  {Works,  II,  p.  193),  and  the 
practice  of  those  writers  who  "think  they  cannot  too  much  stiffen, 
or  raise,  or  ahenate  their  language  from  the  common  idiom" 
{Percy-Shenstone,  p.  74).  Emotion  he  considers  essential  to  poetry. 
"I  think  nothing  truly  poetic,  at  least  no  poetry  worth  composing, 
that  does  not  strongly  affect  one's  passions"  {Works,  II,  p.  176. 
See  also  Percy-Shenstone,  p.   46). 

His  fastidious  taste  in  the  music  of  verse  is  shown  over  and 
over  again,  and  he  finds  "small  pleasure  in  poetical  prose  unless 
exquisitely  well-tuned"  {Works,  III,  p.  38).  Of  MacPherson's 
Ossian,h.t  writes,  "I  think  a  translator  of  a  finer  ear  might  cause 
these  things  to  strike  infinitely  more,  and  yet  be  faithful  to  the 
sense  {Percy-Shenstone,  p.  69).  "Harmony  of  period  and  melody 
of  style,"  Shenstone  asserts,  "have  greater  weight  than  is  generally 
imagined  in  the  judgment  we  pass  upon  writing  and  writers.  As 
a  proof  of  this,  let  us  reflect  what  texts  of  scripture,  what  lines 
of  poetry,  or  what  periods  we  most  remember  and  quote,  either 
in  verse  or  prose;  and  we  shall  find  them  to  be  only  musical  ones" 
{Works,  II,  p.  204.  See  also  pp.  180,  181,  203,  170,  275;  and  Percy- 
Shenstone,  p.  17).  Alliteration  he  declares  "an  easy  kind  of  beau- 
ty," which  has  "probably  had  its  day"  (Works,  II,  pp.  179-180). 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  57 

On  many  lesser  principles  of  literature  there  are  remarks  worth 
noting.  "There  is  nothing  so  disagreeable  in  works  of  humor 
as  an  insipid,  unsupported  vivacity,  the  very  husks  of  drollery" 
(Works,  II,  p.  267).  "A  poet  that  fails  in  writing  becomes  often 
a  morose  critic"  (Works,  II,  p.  186).  "Critics  must  excuse  me 
if  I  compare  them  to  certain  animals  called  asses,  who,  by  gnawing 
vines,  originally  taught  the  great  advantage  of  pruning  them" 
(Works,  II,  p.  192).  "It  is  idle  to  be  much  assiduous  in  the  perusal 
of  inferior  poetry.  Homer,  Vergil,  and  Horace  give  the  true  taste 
in  composition;  and  a  person's  own  imagination  should  be  able 
to  supply  the  rest"  (Works,  II,  p.  194).  "May  not  excess  of 
negligence  discover  affectation  as  well  as  its  opposite  extreme?" 
(Works,  II,  p.  274).  The  aim  of  elegy  is  to  treat  any  kind  of  sub- 
jects "in  such  a  manner  as  to  diffuse  a  pleasing  melancholy" 
(Works,  I,  p.  5).  "The  grand  exception  to  fables  consists  in  giving 
speech  to  animals,  etc.,  a  greater  violation  of  truth  than  appears 
in  any  other  kind  of  writing.  .  .  .  Their  peculiar  advantage 
is  to  remove  the  offensiveness  of  advice.  .  .  .  One  should  perhaps 
pursue  a  medium  betwixt  the  superfluous  garniture  of  La  Fontaine, 
and  the  naked  simplicity  and  laconism  of  Phaedrus"  (Works,  III, 
p.  333).  It  is  Shenstone's  maxim  "  to  take  no  notice  of  undeserved 
censure"  (Percy-Shenstone,  p.  31);  and  of  Grainger's  defense  against 
the  scurrility  of  Smollett,  he  exclaims,  "  Wlio  would  fight  a  scaven- 
ger in  the  street?"  (Percy-Shenstone,  p.  16)  He  tires  of  the 
"modern  shackles  of  a  long  string  of  rhymes,  which  often  "make 
a  second  line  languish  and  appear  only  a  supplement  to  the  first" 
(Percy-Shenstone,  p.  22).  Of  the  distinction  to  be  made  between 
songs  and  ballads,  he  says,  "For  my  own  part,  I,  who  love  by 
means  of  different  words  to  bundle  up  distinct  ideas,  am  apt  to 
consider  a  ballad  as  containing  some  little  story,  either  real  or 
invented"   (Percy-Shenstone,  p.  52). 

Translation  Shenstone  did  not  regard  as  literary  work  of  great 
value.  "I  have  known  a  person  of  the  truest  genius  take  great 
pains  to  translate  a  poem,  when  with  one  tenth  part  of  the  labor 
he  could  have  composed  a  poem  ten  times  better"  (Percy-Shenstone, 
p.  31).  He  urges  Percy  by  all  means  to  read  Young's  Conjectures 
on  Original  Composition,  and  would  not  murmur  at  the  effect  if 
it  should  deter  him  from  writing  any  more  translations  after  that 


58  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

of  Ovid,  provided  it  would  lead  him  to  write  originals  {Percy- 
Shenstone,  p.  17).  Dr.  Brandl  observes  that  this  influential  book 
of  Young's  was  greeted  with  undivided  warmth  only  by  Horace 
Walpole  and  Shenstone  {Percy-Shenstone,  p.  103). 

The  desires  and  dawning  tendencies  of  the  age  Shenstone  under- 
stood remarkably.  He  shows  this  nowhere,  perhaps,  so  plainly  as 
in  a  letter  written  to  Mr.  MacGowan  concerning  the  fragments 
of  Erse  poetry: 

"The  translator  has  taken  pretty  considerable  freedoms  in 
adapting  them  to  the  present  reader.  I  do  not  in  the  least  dis- 
approve of  this,  knowing  by  experience  that  trivial  amendments 
in  these  old  compositions  often  render  them  highly  strilving,  which 
would  otherwise  be  quite  neglected.  ...  I  would  wish  the 
editor  particularly  attentive  to  the  melody  of  his  cadences,  when 
it  may  be  done  without  impeachment  of  his  fidelity.  The  melody 
of  our  verse  has  been,  perhaps,  carried  to  its  utmost  perfection; 
that  of  prose  seems  to  have  been  more  neglected,  and  to  be  capable 
of  greater  than  it  has  yet  attained.  It  seems  to  be  a  very  favorable 
era  for  the  appearance  of  such  irregular  poetry.  The  taste  of  the 
age,  so  far  as  it  regards  plan  and  style,  seems  to  have  been  carried 
to  its  utmost  height.  .  .  .  The  public  has  seen  all  that  art  can 
do,  and  they  want  the  more  striking  effect  of  wild,  original,  en- 
thusiastic genius.  .  .  .  Here  is  indeed  pure,  original  genius, 
the  very  quintessence  of  poetry,  a  few  drops  of  which,  properly 
managed,  are  enough  to  give  a  flavor  to  quart  bottles"  (Nichols: 
Illustrations,  VII,  p.  220). 

Shenstone  was  one  of  the  best-knowoi  men  of  letters  of  his 
time.  His  judgment  and  assistance  were  freely  asked  by  such 
men  as  Jago,  Graves,  Vernon,  Hull,  and  Dodsley,  and  were  freely 
given.  They  were  valued  not  only  for  their  courtesy,  but  also  for 
their  firm  frankness.  He  does  not  fail  occasionally  to  criticize 
his  friends  rather  sharply,  or  at  least  plainly,  as  he  thinks  "this 
is  the  business  of  friendship  in  all  circumstances  of  this  kind" 
{Percy-Shenstone,  p.  63).  He  writes  of  Percy's  cherished  transla- 
tion of  a  Chinese  novel:  "The  novel,  though  in  some  parts  not 
void  of  merit,  must  certainly  draw  its  cliief  support  from  its  value 

as  a   curiosity I  think  the  public  must  esteem  itself  as 

much  obliged  to  the  editor  as  the  editor  has  grounds  to  be  offended 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  59 

at  the  printer"  (Percy-Shenstone,  p.  63).  He  has  asked  Percy  to 
translate  a  certain  tuneful  little  French  chanson,  which  has  charmed 
him,  but  writes  to  the  translator  about  the  result-  "Mr.  Percy, 
I  conceive,  held  the  little  chanson  rather  too  cheap.  The  trans- 
lation will  not  do,  either  in  point  of  metre  or  expression"  (p.  30). 
Another  time  he  says  bluntly,  "The  printed  ballads  you  sent  are, 
I  think,  by  no  means  worth  preserving"  (Works,  II,  p.  45). 

Dr.  Hecht  assures  us  that  the  correspondence  with  Robert 
Dodsley  shows  much  of  Shenstone's  judgment  and  enriching 
assistance  in  the  collection  of  Poems  by  Several  Hands  and  in 
Dodsley 's  own  tragedy  of  Cleone  (Percy-Shenstone,  p.  XVI).  His 
pubHshed  letters  also  show  this  (Works,  III,  pp.  257,  282,  288, 
298, 303),  and  show  besides  how  much  he  helped  and  influenced  the 
same  pubhsher  in  his  collection  of  fables  (Works,  III,  pp.  333,  361, 
362,  365;  Percy-Shenstone,  pp.  41,  69).  But  his  fullest,  most 
positive,  and  most  far-reaching  influence  of  this  nature  was  in 
connection  with  the  Reliques  of  Ancient  English  Poetry  of  Thomas 
Percy,  who  was  then  the  young  chaplain  of  the  Earl  of  Sussex,  and 
afterwards    Bishop   of   Dromore. 

Although  Percy,  with  his  apologetic  air  in  the  original  preface 
of  his  Reliques,  did  not  suspect  it,  the  volume  was  to  be  one  of  the 
strongest,  most  wholesome,  and  most  lasting  influences  in  bringing 
English  poetry  back  from  the  stilted  and  the  stereotyped  to  fresh- 
ness and  to  pulsing  life  (Beginnings  of  the  English  Romantic  Move- 
ment, p  133;  Percy-Shenstone,  p.  xi).  Dr.  Johnson  had  advised 
the  publication  of  the  ballads,  and  had  seemed  to  approve  it, 
promising  to  help  in  selecting  and  revising,  and  to  furnish  an 
abundance  of  learned  notes.  "These  promises,  however,"  writes 
Percy,  "he  never  executed,  nor,  except  for  a  few  slight  hints  de- 
livered viva  voce,  did  he  furnish  any  contributions,  etc."  (Percy- 
Shenstone,  p.  9)  Furthermore,  in  the  Rambler  in  1751  he  ridiculed 
the  taste  for  ballads;  and  he  was  not  a  man  of  changeable  mind 
(Beginnings  of  the  English  Romantic  Movement,  p.  134).  Instead 
of  Johnson,  Shenstone  becamie  Percy's  constant  adviser  in  this 
matter,  until  his  illness  and  death,  giving  freely  and  fully  of  his 
advice  in  frequent  letters  and  in  prolonged  conversations  with 
Percy  at  the  Leasowes  (Percy-Shenstone,  p  49).  "  The  manuscript 
was  shown  to  several  learned  and  ingenious  friends,"  writes  the 


60  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

editor,  "who  thought  the  contents  too  curious  to  be  consigned 
to  obUvion,  and  importuned  the  possessor  to  select  some  of  them 
and  give  them  to  the  press.  ...  At  length  the  importunity  of 
his  friends  prevailed,  and  he  could  refuse  nothing  to  such  judges 
as  the  author  of  the  Rambler  and  the  late  Mr.  Shenstone, "  {Reliques 
of  Ancient  English  Poetry,  1,  p.  xiii).  "The  plan  of  this  work  was 
settled  in  concert  with  the  late  elegant  Mr.  Shenstone,  who  was 
to  have  borne  a  joint  share  in  it,  had  not  death  unhappily  pre- 
vented him.  ...  It  is  doubtless  a  great  loss  to  this  work  that 
Mr.  Shenstone  never  saw  more  than  about  a  tliird  of  one  of  these 
volumes,  as  prepared  for  the  press"  (p.  xvii). 

Without  Shenstone,  the  old  ballads  so  fortunately  saved  from 
kindling  fires  to  warm  the  hands,  would  probably  never  have  been 
published  to  warm  the  heart;  for,  although  they  gave  lively  pleasure 
to  the  owner,  he  was  much  afraid  of  being  ridiculed  as  a  mere 
ballad-monger  if  he  showed  a  taste  for  such  things  {Percy-Shenstone, 
p.  87).  His  first  mention  of  his  "curious  old  manuscript  collection 
of  ancient  ballads  "  (1757)  brings  from  Shenstone  the  eager  response, 
"You  pique  my  curiosity  extremely  by  the  mention  of  that  ancient 
manuscript,  as  there  is  nothing  gives  me  greater  pleasure  than 
the  simpUcity  of  style  and  sentiment  that  is  observable  in  old 
English  ballads.  If  aught  could  add  to  that  pleasure,  it  would 
be  an  opportunity  of  perusing  them  in  your  company  at  the  Lea- 
sowes,  and  pray  do  not  think  of  publishing  them  until  you  have 
given  me  that  opportunity.  .  .  .  Suppose  you  consider  your 
manuscript  as  an  hoard  of  gold,  somewhat  defaced  by  time,  from 
which,  however,  you  may  be  able  to  draw  supplies  upon  occasion, 
and  with  which  you  may  enrich  the  world  hereafter  under  more 
current  impressions"  {Percy-Shenstone,  pp.  6,  7).  Percy,  delighted 
with  this  interest  on  the  part  of  the  man  of  note,  offered  now  a  copy 
of  one  of  the  ballads,  and  now  a  transcript  of  a  large  number,  as 
a  friendly  bribe  for  "making  corrections"  on  some  of  his  own 
work  (Percy-Shenstone,  pp.  10,  15).  Again,  by  promising  a  sight 
of  the  whole  folio,  he  tried  to  induce  Shenstone  to  visit  him  (p.  21), 
and  the  home-lover  acknowledged  that  the  temptation  was  great 
(p.  24).  After  Percy's  visit  to  the  Leasowes  in  1750,  interest 
waxed  yet  keener,  and  many  pages  of  correspondence  s\ere  given 
to  discussion  of  the  treasures.     As  his  heart  failed  him  now  and 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  61 

then,  Shenstone  encouraged  and  even  urged  the  pubUcation  of 
the  ballads  (pp.  58,  63)  and  wrote:  "There  is  no  room  that  I  can 
see  to  question  the  reception  that  your  work  is  Uke  to  meet  with. 
If  I  have  any  talent  at  conjecture,  all  people  of  taste  throughout 
the  kingdom  will  rejoice  to  see  a  judicious,  a  correct  and  elegant 
edition  of  such  pieces"  (p.  46).  Shenstone  aided  in  collecting 
old  Scotch  and  Welsh  ballads  for  the  book  (pp.  58,  86)  and  pro- 
mised help  in  making  designs  for  it  (p.  54). 

His  advice  was  especially  emphatic  and  effective  on  two  points 
— restraint  in  the  size  and  quality  of  the  contents,  and  a  certain 
yielding  to  the  prevailing  taste  of  the  day.  He  hoped  that  the 
"prodigious  pains"  of  Mr.  Percy  would  "be  employed  rather 
to  fill  a  moderate  collection  with  the  best  readings  of  good  ballads 
than  to  swell  such  a  collection  to  any  great  extent"  (p.  51).  And 
he  gave  the  w^arning,  "Once  for  all,  it  is  extremely  certain  that 
an  over-proportion  of  this  kind  of  ballast  [ballads  with  "not  a 
single  particle  of  poetical  merit"]  will  sink  your  vessel  to  the 
bottom  of  the  sea.  Therefore  be  upon  your  guard  in  time.  Nei- 
ther have  you  any  reason  to  be  apprehensive  that  your  volumes 
should  be  deficient  in  point  of  bulk"  (p.  79.  See  also  pp.  44,  66, 
88).  Percy  heeded  the  advice.  He  rephed:  "To  oblige  you,  I 
have  stipulated  with  the  bookseller  only  to  print  two  volumes, 
provided  the  materials  for  a  third  are  not  quite  so  good  as  those  of 
the  two  first,  which  are  to  be  printed  off  first  out  of  the  very  cream 
and  quintessence  of  our  collections.  And,  to  prevent  ever  de- 
grading the  work  by  additional  volumes,  etc.,  we  have  made  an 
express  article  that,  if  we  should  at  length  find  very  excellent 
materials  for  a  third  volume,  no  inducement  whatever  is  to  give 
birth  to  a  fourth.  .  .  .  You  see  I  shall  give  up  near  forty  pounds 
by  dropping  a  third  volume  to  oblige  you;  but  I  assure  you  I  shall 
do  it  with  the  greatest  pleasure  to  obtain  the  approbation  of  so 
valuable  a  friend  and  so  excellent  a  judge,  and  no  dirty  motives 
of  lucre  shall  induce  me  to  disgrace  a  work,  which  you  are  so 
indulgent  as  to  think  well  of"  (p.  54). 

Percy  has  been  much  criticised  for  publishing  the  ancient 
poems  with  retouchmg,  modernizing,  and  conventionalizing;  in 
this  matter  he  agreed  with  Shenstone,  who  strongly  advised  the 
very  course   that  he  pursued.      At   first   thought,   such   action 


62  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

seems  to  show  lack  of  artistic  judgment,  and  of  literary  honor;  yet 
when  we  consider  the  reason  for  which  it  was  done  and  the  absence 
of  any  standards  in  such  matters  at  that  time,  we  may  surely  admit 
that  tliese  eighteenth  century  editors  were  in  the  right.  Shenstone 
felt  that  unless  these  "amendments"  were  made,  the  old  ballads 
would  be  entirely  neglected  by  all  but  pedants  (Nichols :  Illustrations, 
VII,  p.  220).  He  would  seek  a  larger  audience,  the  general  reading 
public;  he  would  not  have  the  treasure  pubhshed  unimproved, 
only  "for  the  benefit  of  other  artists"  {Percy-Shenstone,  p.  75). 
Those  mthout  learning  would  not  value  the  old  pieces  in  their 
unchanged  form,  would  hardly  even  read  them.  Shenstone  under- 
stood his  age  so  well  that  it  seems  almost  certain  this  method, 
now  so  objectionable,  was  largely  the  means  of  securing  for  the 
Reliques  their  wide  and  deep  influence,  even  though  it  was  carried 
to  an  almost  absurd  extent  in  the  suggestion  that  the  Fight  at 
Otterburne  should  be  omitted,  as  having  more  merit  as  a  curiosity 
than  as  poetry,  till  the  public's  reception  of  the  first  two  volumes 
was  certain  (p.  66).  He  wrote,  "I  believe  I  shall  never  make 
any  objections  to  such  improvements  as  you  bestow  .  .  .  unless 
you  were  plainly  to  contradict  antiquity,  which  I  am  pretty  sure 
will  never  be  the  case"  (p.  44).  And  so  the  corrections  went  on; 
even  the  following  atrocious  "improvement"  suggested  by  Percy 
was  allowed   to  pass: 

His  hair  was  like  the  threeds  of  gold 

Shot  frae  the  burning  sun,   {Drawne  frae  Minerva's  loom) 

His  lips  like  roses  drapping  dew — 

His  breath  was  a  perfume. 

The  same  yielding  to  the  general  taste  of  the  times  is  shown 
in  much  of  Shenstone's  advice  as  to  the  arrangement  of  the  volumes. 
He  would  not  have  the  text  smothered  by  notes  (p.  47).  Short 
poems  should  be  mingled  with  the  longer  ones,  lest  the  reader 
become  weary.  It  would  be  well  to  place  first  in  each  separate 
volume  the  older  pieces,  which  are  irregular  and  sub-obscure;  then 
a  series  of  later  ones;  and  finally  some  modern  pieces  in  a  similar 
style.  By  placing  in  the  first  volume  all  the  obsolete  pieces,  "not 
agreeable  to  the  general  taste,"  the  beginning  of  the  work  "might 
be  liable  to  give  disgust"  (pp.  75,  66).  Much  feehng  of  responsi- 
bility is  shown  in  Shenstone's  insistence  that,  even  after  his  de- 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  63 

tailed  opinion  about  each  poem  and  the  arrangement  of  all,  he 
shall  receive  a  transcription  of  the  whole  before  it  is  sent  to  press 
(p.  43). 

Conclusion 

As  we  look  back  over  the  quiet  life  and  unhurried  work  of 
William  Shenstone,  we  realize  that  he  accomplished  much.  He 
lived  and  died  a  gentleman,  always  courteous,  sincere,  sensitive, 
affectionate,  with  a  blending  of  gentle  melancholy  and  playful 
humor.  With  small  means  he  made  his  pasture-land  a  place  of 
natural  though  artistic  beauty,  which  did  much  to  form  and  fix 
the  best  modern  taste  in  EngUsh  gardening.  As  a  poet  he  has 
left  us  at  least  one  pastoral  whose  sweet,  graceful  melody  and 
genuineness  of  tender  feeling  still  please  even  the  critic's  ear 
and  Unger  in  his  memory;  as  poet,  too,  he  is  a  pioneer  in  a  literary 
form  now  well  recognized  and  well  loved  in  English  literature — 
the  narrative  of  the  everyday  life  of  common  people.  As  humorist, 
his  fine,  quiet  playfulness  has  triumphed  over  his  critics  of  clumsier 
nature  and  brought  them  to  absurdities  of  statement  simply 
because  they  did  not  perceive  it.  He  is  an  essayist  whose  fresh 
and  gracious  little  papers  may  well  stand  near  Addison's  and  be 
remembered  with  them.  He  wrote  letters  whose  pages  have  still 
an  easy  charm  for  one  who  sits  down  at  leisure  to  enjoy  his  hearty 
friendship,  his  interest  in  all  books  and  movements  new  in  the 
literary  world  of  his  day,  and  his  discriminating  judgment  of  such 
matters.  To  his  encouragement  and  opinions  as  a  critic  was  largely 
due  the  publication  of  Percy's  Reliques  with  its  widespread  in- 
fluence. In  a  time  when  the  fetters  of  rigid  French  convention- 
ality still  lay  heavy  upon  English  letters,  he  turned  both  his  theory 
and  his  practice,  on  the  whole,  towards  simple  naturalness,  though 
he  did  not  always  achieve  it,  especially  in  his  poetry.  He  loved 
and  lived  the  simple  life.  Surely  such  work  has  value  in  itself; 
such  influence  has  been  a  working  force,  though  always  quiet 
and  often  unrecognized  or  unacknowledged.  Surely,  then,  to 
William  Shenstone  is  due  lasting  respect  and  a  share,  though 
small,  of  enduring  honor  from  those  who  would  judge  fairly  of 
the  makers  and  the  making  of  our  changing,  living  literature. 


CHAPTER  V 

Unpublished  Poems  from  the  Manuscript 

To  Miss  .  .  .  not  dancing  at  a  Ball. 

While  round  in  wild  Rotations  hurld, 
These  shining  Forms  I  view, 

Methinks  y^  busy  restless  World 
Is  imag'd  in  a  Few. 

So  may  the  giddy  World  advance ! 

A.nd  thus  may  Fate  decree, 
It  still  may  have  it's  active  Dance, 

Whilst  /  retire  with  Thee! 

W.  S. 

For  Valentine's  Day 

Recitative. 

Twas  Spring,  when  all  the  plumy  Quire 

In  nuptial  Treaty  joins; 
When  tepid  Gales  with  Love  conspire, 

And  bless  their  soft  Designs; 
Melissa  rang'd  y^  Fountain's  side, 
And  thus,  in  artless  accents,  cry'd. 

Air 

Happy  Warblers!    Love  enjoying. 

Free  from  Censure,  free  from  Fears! 

Happy  Love !    which,  never  cloying, 
Musick's  tunefuU  voice  endears! 

What  can  mortal  sv/eeter  prove, 

Than  the  Chorus  of  the  Grove? 

Thus  to  sing  &  thus  to  love! 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  65 

Recitative. 

The  Boy  that  lov'd  MeUssa  best, 

Behind  the  flow'ring  Limes  was  laid; 

He  pour'd  the  secret  from  his  Breast, 
And  thus  bespoke  y^  blushing  Maid. 

Air 

If  a  Linnet's  vocal  strain 

Can  Mehssa's  Envy  move; 
If  a  Blackbird's  amorous  Pain 

Thus  commend  the  Sweets  of  Love, 
What  to  Deities  can  be. 
Above  the  sweet  FeHcity, 
Like  you  to  sing,  or  Love  like  we? 

For  a  Beech. 

Ye  rural  Maids,  &  rustic  Swains! 

That  here  your  annual  vows  renew! 
Are  Kings  or  Queens  so  free  from  Pains, 

Are  they  so  blest  in  Love  as  you? 

Then  may  ye  Uve  content  w/   Fate; 

Yet  ever  seem  your  Fate  to  moan; 
Shou'd  Courtiers  know  your  happy  state. 

Ye  shou'd  not  taste  it  long,  alone. 

Sonnet. 

The  Crown  encircled  Juno's  Hair; 
The  Crescent  bright  was  Cynthia's  Share; 
The  Helmet  mark'd  Minerva's  Mien; 
But  Smiles  bespoke  the  Cyprian  Queen. 

Her  Train  was  form'd  of  Smiles  &  Loves; 
Her  Chariot  drawn  by  gentlest  Doves; 
And  from  her  Zone  the  Nymphs  might  find, 
'Twas  Beauty's  Province  to  be  kind. 


66  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Why  then  will  lovely  Delia  drown 
Celestial  Beauties,  in  a  Frown? 
Smile  from  your  Brows  those  Clouds  away, 
And,  to  that  Heav'n,  restore  y*^  day. 

Nor  let  it  grieve  my  charming  Fair, 
That  I,  her  slave,  the  Blessing  share; 
That  Smiles  an  equal  Life  impart 
To  Delia's  Charms — &  Sfrephon's  Heart. 

S. 

To  the  Honourable  M''-^  Knight,  at  y^  Time  She  was  laying 

out  her  Villa. 

Tho'  ev'ry  blooming  Plant  conspires 
To  grace  y^  Tracts  Asteria  treads; 

And  softest  Notes,  &  sweetest  Lyres 
Endear  Asteria's  favour'd  Meads; 

Yet  may  her  Candour  not  disdain 

The  tribute  of  a  distant  Plain. 

And  may  that  smiling  Virtue  shew. 
What  Fates  on  distant  Plains  attend; 

That,  if  a  Cadence  smoothly  flow. 
Or  if  a  tuneless  Line  offend, 

The  first  her  fair  Idea  grac'd; 

And  that  her  Absence  caus'd  y*^  last. 

How  oft  my  roving  Fancy  leads 

To  Shades  that  soothe  her  pensive  Hour; 

Where  Nature  reigns,  whence  Art  recedes, 
Yet  leaves  improv'd  her  charming  Bow'r; 

Recedes,  Asteria's  Taste  refines, 

And  there,  with  Nature  too,  she  shines. 

The  verdant  Gloom  w'''  what  Dehght 

Each  well-amus'd  Spectator  views! 
How  pleas'd  he  bids  Adieu  to  Light! 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  67 

To  all,  but  that  which  Yoti  diffuse! 
With  just  Regret  is  that  resign'd, 
Which  chears  y*:  Eye,  &  charms  y^  Mind. 

What  Transports  in  each  Breast  supply 
The  feather 'd  warbler's  melting  strains! 

The  lawless  Pindars  of  the  Sky 

That  harmonize  these  bUssfull  Plains! 

That,  to  the  Sun,  their  Notes  renew, 

While  tunefull  Floris  sings  to  you. 

Where  y^  tall  solemn  Grove  aspires, 
How  fair  those  artfull  Turrets  rise! 

And  where  this  humbler  vale  retires, 
Now  poHsh'd  Nature  charms  our  Eyes! 

O  skill'd  to  guide  her  Footsteps  true! 

Skill'd,  with  your  Pencil,  to  pursue. 

Nor  blame  the  less  presuming  Muse, 
That  humbly  paints  a  Grott  or  Lawn; 

And  seems  the  Pattern  to  refuse. 

Whence  noblest  Virtues  might  be  drawn; 

The  lovely  Fruits  of  Taste  &  Care 

Tis  Fame,  as  well  as  Bliss  to  share. 

Yet  even  these,  their  various  Grace, 

When  You  your  Wit  &  Charms  display, 

These,  w''-''  w'*"  Pleasure  all  must  trace, 
All  may,  without  Amaze,  survey. 

Reserve,  ye  Swains,  your  fond  Surprize, 

To  lavish  on  Asteria's  Eyes. 

The  Pilgrim  who  bewilder'd  roves 

Where  sweet  Idalia's  Goddess  reigns. 

Thro'  myrtle  Thickets,  Citron  Groves, 
And  lilly'd  Banks  &  roseate  Plains, 

Wou'd  slight  their  Charms,  if  she  were  seen, 

And  pleas'd  adore  his  fav'rite  Queen. 

W.  S. 


68  william  shenstone  and  his  critics 

The  Sanctuary. 

Too  scornfull  Pleasure!  check  thy  Pace; 
Breathless   &  faint  I   urge  y^  Chace; 
And  now  I  loiter  slow  behind, 
While  fleeting,  Thou  outstripst  y^  Wind. 

Stay,  gentle  Pleasure !  stay  thine  Haste 
Till  Life's  allotted  Period's  past; 
Soothe  envious  Time  till  that  is  o'er, 
And  He  shall  tyrannize  no  more. 

Life  can  alas!  no  more  amuse; 
And  Pleasure  flies  &  Pain  pursues: 
All  sick  &  faint  w*^  fond  Desire, 
To  what  safe  Shrine  shall  I  retire? 

A  Shrine  there  is,  my  Delia's  Breast; 
Near  that  fair  Altar  let  me  rest; 
To  that  kind  Refuge  quick  repair. 
And  Pain  dare  never  seize  me  there. 

S. 

[Above  a  Painting  of  a  Stream  Bordered  by  Trees] 

Here  Luxb'rough  sate;  Ye  streams  y*  gently  glide! 
Whene'er  ye  chance  to  meet  a  richer  Tide, 
Ah!  warn  it  not  to  sHght  your  Httle  store; 
Say  Luxb'rough  prais'd  you,  &  you  ask  no  more. 

Inscription 
For  a  medicinal  Fountain, 
in  my  Farm 

Thou  sacred  Nymph!  whose  pious  Care 
Pours  from  thine  urn  this  min'ral  Rill; 

Whose  healing  Draughts,  like  crystal  fair, 
In  pleasing  Murmurs  here   distill! 

Who  guidst  y^  Stream,  &  joyst  to  dwell 
Where  Murmurs  soft  w^''  Use  agree, 

May  Phoebus  haunt  this  hallow'd  Well, 
And  all  Ms  Sisters  learn  of  Thee. 

Pupils. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  69 

The  Roses  reconcil'd. 

By  Party  Rage  &  stern  Debate 

Idalia's  Realm  was  tore; 
Two  Beauties  sought  to  rule  y^  State, 

And   rival   Hues    they   wore. 

The  gentle  Che  soft  &  kind 

The  Rose  she  bore,  was  pale; 
The  rural  Dian  hop'd  to  find 

Her  crimson  Buds  prevail. 

Pity  Love's  genrous  Train  shou'd  grow, 

Or  shou'd  continue  Foes; 
Go  forth,  my  Dear!  my  DeHa,  go 

These  civil  Feuds  compose. 

Soon  wilt  thou  see  thy  Pow'r  divine 

Oer  ev'ry  Eye  extend; 
Since  neer  did  Cheek  so  soft  as  thine 

The  varying  Roses  blend. 

M""  Shenstone  to  M'  Whistler 

'Tis  strange,  that  sway'd  by  Passion's  Laws 
While  thousands  wide  of  Reason  stray, 

Some  err  with  Credit,  nay,  Applause; 
And  some,  ignobly,  lose  their  way. 

The  Name  of  Prudence,  injur'd  Name! 

Is  giv'n  y^  mercenary  Mind; 
Has  Fortune  seiz'd  y*?  Trump  of  Fame? 

Or  is  she  too,  like  Fortune,  bhnd? 

To  lure  some  ill-experienc'd  Heir, 

The  formal  Cit  assiduous  toils; 
He  spreads  unseen  y^  fatal  Snare, 

Yet  neer  at  Ease  enjoys  y^  Spoils. 


70  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

In  roseate  shades,  &  myrtle  Bow'rs, 
Wildly  y^  raptured  Poet  roves; 

Enjoys  y^  balm  of  op'ning  Flow'rs, 
And  melting  Musick  of  y^  Groves, 

Yet  He  among  y^  Wise  is  plac'd, 

He  seems  alone  to  have  y^  Blessing, 

wins 

Who  gains  what  he  can  never  taste; 

Not  He  who  tastes  ev'n  not  possessing. 

Florio,  a  Plant  by  tender  Hands 

On  Paper  carv'd,  with  Rapture  gains; 

Gomez,  the  timber' d  Oak  demands. 

Yon  spreading  tree  that  shades  y^  Plains. 

Give  me  says  ...  an  Otho's  Head, 

Tho'  Lands,  Trees,  Tenements,  be  sold; 

Him  .  .  .  sneers,  &  pleas'd  indeed 
Views  modern  Majesty  in  Gold. 

The  Merchant  buys  a  Vessel's  Load; 

Goes  home  &  brags  on't  to  his  Par'tner: 
Mead  hugs  his  vast  prodigious  Toad, 
Swearing  By  G— d  he's  bit  y^  Gard'ner. 

O  You !  who  by  a  skillfull  Aim 

From  right  Opinion  seldom  err, 

Will  you  the  lavish  trifler  blame? 

Can  you  y^  sordid  Breast  prefer? 

For  this  the  Sum — our  vain  Desires 

Whether  or  Wealth  or  Whim  allures, 

vacant 

The  trivial  Sterling  one  admires; 
And  one,  the  trifles  it  procures. 

Yet  sure,  of  all  y^  various  Bliss 

A  social  Mind  can  wish  to  share, 

What  most  the  Wise  shou'd  value,  is, 
A  generous  Friend,  or  gentle  Fair. 

Whose  spreading  antlers  shade  y^  plains. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  71 

Whene'er  y^  Lover's  Ardours  move, 

Or  Friendship  warms,  a  breast  sincere. 

What  Joys  so  ravishing,  as  Love? 

Or  what,  like  Friendship,  persevere? 

When  Life's  chagrining  Ills  increase, 

To  some  soft  Bosom  we  repair; 
That  sacred  Shrine  protects  our  Peace, 

hardly 

And  Pain  dare  never  seize  us  there. 

Friendship,  y^  Muses  other  Theme, 

When  rival  Passions  are  at  strife, 
Guards  us  from  ev'ry  wild  Extreme, 

And  skreens  us,  thro'  y^  Clime  of  Life. 

Had  poor  Kilmarnock  known  a  Friend, 

Their  ill-star'd  Biass  to  controul. 
He  ne'er  had  known  the  timeless  End 

That  shocks  the  temper  of  my  Soul. 

"The  Centinel  that  sleeps,  shall  dye," 

Why,  Virtue  nods,  some  luckless  Hour; 
Well  may  He  wish  some  Friend  were  nigh, 

such 

That,  on  these  Terms,  defends  y^  Tow'r. 

But  Phoebus  now,  who  bids  me  quit 

The  Flow'rets  that  in  Fancy  spring. 

Has  giv'n  me  Warmth  instead  of  Wit; 
Content  to  feel  what  others  sing. 

And  sweetly  sing — The  Fair,  The  Friend 
Have  shar'd  the  Poet's  noblest  Lays; 

Yet  none  could  e'er  his  Theme  transcend; 
None,  to  the  Merit,  suit  the  Praise. 

The  Image  of  one  soft-ey'd  Maid 

Dispells  the  Gloom  of  vulgar  Care; 

Refines  the  Taste,  &  lends  it's  Aid 

In  all  that's  gen'rous,  mild,  or  fair. 


72  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

generous 

The  Image  of  a  virtuous  Friend 

Confirms  our  virtue,  Noon  &  Morn; 

And  may  that  Friendship  never  end, 
Which  I  profess,  &  you  adorn. 

The  Ever-green 

When  genial  May's  indulgent  Care 

Had  giv'n  the  Grove  it's  wonted  Shade; 

Pensive  &  grave,  my  charming  Fair, 

Beneath  a  branching  Lime,  was  laid. 

Flourish,  said  I,  those  favour'd  Boughs! 

And  ever  soothe  y^  purest  Flames! 
Witness  to  none  but  faithfull  vows! 

Wounded  by  none  but  faithfull  Names! 

Yield  ev'ry  Tree  that  forms  y^  Grove 

To  this  which  pleas'd  my  wand'ring  Dear! 

Range  where  ye  list,  ye  Bands  of  Love, 
Ye  still  shall  seem  to  revel  here! 

She  smild,  &,  whilst  her  lovely  Arm 
Her  fair  reclining  Head  sustain'd, 

Betray'd  she  felt  some  fresh  Alarm, 

And  thus  y^  meaning  Smile  explain'd. 

When  vernal  Suns  shine  forth  no  more. 
Will  then  this  Lime  its  Shelter  yield? 

When  wintry  Storms  around  me  roar, 
Will  not  it's  Leaves  bestrew  y^  Field? 

Yet  faithfull  then  the  Fir  shall  last — 
I  smile,  she  said,  but  ah!  I  tremble, 

To  think,  when  my  fair  Season's  past. 
Which  Damon  then  will  most  resemble. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTOHE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  73 

An  obvious  Answer 

Too  tim'rous  Maid,  can  Time  or  Chance 

A  pure  ingenuous  Flame  controul? 
O  lay  aside  that  tender  Glance; 

It  melts  my  Frame,  It  kills  my  Soul. 

Were  Daphne's  Charms  alone  admir'd, 

Frail  Origin  of  female  Sway! 
My  Flame,  Uke  vulgar  Flames,  inspir'd. 

Might  then,  like  vulgar  Flames,  decay. 

But  whilst  thy  Soul  shall  seem  thus  fair. 

Thy  Mind  retain  it's  wonted  Mien, 
Thou  mayst  resign  that  Shape  &  Air, 

Yet   find   thy   Swain — an   Ever-green. 

Stanzas 

On  the  Discovery  of  Chelt'nam  Waters 

by  Pigeons 

Matre  Dea  monstrante  viam! 

Go  forth,  my  Doves,  y^  Goddess  cry'd, 
On  Chelf  nam's  fiow'ry  Plains  reside;  . 
Near  yonder  Fountains  feed  &  Play, 
And  you,  my  Delia,  mark  their  way. 

And  where  they  close  their  rapid  Road, 
Be   there  awhile   my   Nymphs  abode: 
For  there  returning  Health  shall  warm; 
Shall  reinspirit  ev'ry  Charm. 

That  sovereign  steel,  whose  Pow'r  is  known, 
To  seat  the  Monarch  on  his  Throne, 
In  yonder  Mineral  Springs  shall  rise, 
To  fix  the  sway  of  Delia's  Eyes. 


74  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Their  former  Bloom  thy  cheeks  shall  gain, 
Thy  Lovers  feel  their  former  Pain; 
For   thus  went  forth  a  late   Decree, 
Sign'd  by  the  Queen  of  Health  &  Me. 

Nor  envy  you  y^  gUtt'ring  Prize 
That  blest  my  Trojan's*  dazled  Eyes; 
Not  more  propitious  to  his  Vow 
I  pointed  out  y^  golden  Bough. 

Oh!  Health  excells  the  radiant  Spray, 
Which  rul'd  that  Heroe's  destin'd  way; 
He  to  Elysian  scenes  cou'd  steer, 
But  Health  bestows  Elysium  here. 

The  Doves  divide  their  airy  way; 
The  Nymph  as  fair,  as  soft  as  They, 
Beholds  them  shut  their  silver  wings; 
And  seeks  the  salutary  Springs. 

Ah  faithfull,  faithless  Streams!  that  flow 
The  Source  of  Health,  y^  Source  of  Woe! 
That  give  her  Eyes  their  wonted  Fire, 
Whilst   all    that   gaze,   alas!  expire. 
*Aeneas.      .  S. 


Lysander  to  Chloe. 

Tis  true  my  Wish  shall  never  find 

Another  Nymph,   so  fair,   so   true! 

And  all  that's  bright  &  all  that's  kind, 
I  ever  own'd  were  met  in  you. 

And  I  with  gratefuU  zeal  cou'd  haste 
To  China  for  y^  merest  Toy; 

Cou'd  scorch  whole  years  on  Lybia's  waste. 
To  give  my  Dear   a  moment's  Joy. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  75 

But  fickle  as  the  Wave  or  Wind, 

I  once  may  slight  those  lovely  Arms; 

Pardon  a  free  ingenuous  Mind — 

I  do  not  half  deserve  thy  Charms. 

If  I  in  any  Art  excell, 

Tis,  in  soft  strains  to  breathe  my  Flame; 
But  so  much  sweetness  bids  me  tell, 

It  will  not  long  persist  y^  same. 

I  know  it's  Season  will  expire; 

I  know  it's  Transports  will  be  flown; 
Nor  more  thy  matchless  Breast  admire, 

Than  I  detest  &  scorn  my  own. 

W. 

The  Amorous  Inconstant. 

Ah  me!  the  flatt'ring  Scene  is  o'er; 
And  Verse,  &  Numbers  charm  no  more: 
For  why,  my  Pain  my  hopeless  Woe, 
Nor  verse  can  paint,  nor  Numbers  shew. 

0  now  farewell  that  soothing  Lay 
Where  many  a  Fountain  seem'd  to  play! 
Where  many  a  vernal  Flowret  shone — ! 
Ly Sander's  Occupation' s  gone.^ 

Not  long  releas'd  from  Silvia's  Chain, 
How  soon  I  dar'd  the  Toils  again ! 
By  Fate,  by  Nature  doom'd  to  prove 
The  Folly  &  the  Force  of  Love. 

Thro  all  y*"  Grove,  my  fooUsh  Tongue 
Proclaim'd  aloud  my  wond'rous  wrong, 
My  wond'rous  Torture  to  display, 

1  stop'd  y^  Stranger  on  his  Way. 

t  Parody,  Othello's  occupation's  gone.     See  Othello. 


76  ^VILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Unweeting 

Imprudent  both  to  young  &  old 

curs'd 

I  blam'd  y'  fatal  Pow'r  of  Gold; 
And,  courting  all  that  deign'd  to  hear, 
I  blam'd  it  in  a  Miser's  Ear. 


And  now  I  feel  my  fiutt'ring  Heart 
Must  act  again  the  trifling  Part; 
Nor  all  that  Foe  or  Friend  shall  say 
Can  lessen  Cynthia's  rigid  Sway. 


But  other  Nymphs,  but  other  Fires 
May  banish  old  by  new  Desires; 
Till  one  of  more  imperious  Eye 

let 

Dissolve  my  chains  &  bid  me  dye. 

W. 

Imitated  at  large  from  Horace's  "Petti  nihil  me,  etc.   "practis'd  on  a 
Miser's,   etc:"  Line  4th  qu: 


[No  title] 
Then  take  a  Nymph  benign  &  fair 

A  soul  refin'd,  a  generous  spirit 
And  I'll  insure  you  happiness 

That  equals  all — but  what  you  merit. 


Unpublished  Latin  Inscriptions  prom  the  Manuscript 

IN    memoriam    flirtillae, 

pusillae  nimirum  canis,  et  innociiae; 

agilis,  blandae,  tenerae,  pulcherrimae; 

quae    dolore    partus    correpta, 
amoris  sui  signa   ad   mortem  usque  edidit; 

AT  EHEU!  sine  PROLE  PEREUNS 
NULLAM  RELIQUIT  PAREM. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  77 

0  Viator! 

Tales  animas  in  coelis  requiescere 

Confide 

Tales  ne  terris  desint 

Precare. 

Hunc  juxta  locum 

Mortales  sui  exuvias 

Lxx  Annorum  Invidia 

Tandem  dilaceras 

Placide  deposuit 

M.  A. 

Amicum  mancipium  Domino 
Frugi  q^  sit  satis. 


Inscriptions  on  a  small  Mausoleum  supported  by  Four  Ionic  PiUars,  at 
M'^^^'  Bateman's  at  old  Windsor,  an  elegant  Seat  on  the  Banks  of  the  Thames, 
in  the  Gothic  Stile,  surrounded  by  a  Grove,  w'  16  Acres  of  Ground  well  orna- 
mented. 

Ut  Animarum  immortalium  Exuviae 

Ab  ignobili  terrae  Pulvere  secernerentur. 

Et  in  ameniori  positae  loco 

Blanda  fruerentur  Quiete 

Ubique  dispersas  collegit, 

Et  in  hoc  tumulo  repone  voluit 

Ricardus  Batemane, 

Amenitatis  Cultor,  et  primaevae 

Antiquitatis  Restitutor,  Pietatis  Ergo. 


D.  M. 

Ad  conservandos  Cineres 

lUustrium  virorum, 
Antique =vindesorensium 

Quorum  nomina,  et  virtutes 
Parvula  haec  non  capit  tabella 

Hie  manus  ob  patriam.  etc. 


78  ■  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 


Poems  Having  More  Stanzas  in  the  Manuscript  Than  in 

Their  Published  Forms 

Daphne's  Visit. 

Ye  Doves!  for  whom  I  rear'd  y^  Grove, 
With  melting  Lays  salute  my  Love; 
My  Daphne  with  your  Notes  detain, 
Or  I  have  rear'd  y^  Grove  in  vain. 

Ye  Flow'rs!  which  early  Spring  supplies. 
Display  at  once  your  brightest  Dyes; 
That  she  your  op'ning  charms  may  see, 
Or  what  were  else  your  charms  to  me? 

Kind  Zephyr!  brush  each  fragrant  Flow'r, 
And  shed  its  odours  round  my  Bow'r; 
Or  ne'er  again,  O  gentle  Wind! 
Shall  I,  in  thee,  refreshment  find. 

Ye  Streams!  if  eer  w*-^  Art  I  strove. 
Your  native  murmurs  to  improve. 
May  each  soft  Murmur  soothe  my  Fair, 
Or  Oh!  'twill  deepen  my  Despair. 

Be  sure,  ye  Willows!  you  be  seen 
Array'd  in  Uveliest  Robes  of  Green; 
Or  I  will  tear  your  sHghted  Boughs, 
And  let  them  fade  around  my  Brows. 

And  Thou,  my  Grott!  whose  lonely  Bounds 
The   melancholy   Pine   surrounds, 
May  she  admire   thy  peaceful!  Gloom, 
Or  thou  shalt  prove  her  Lover's  Tomb. 

W.  S. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  79 


In  Winter  1746. 

Ye  Groves  with  wintry  Rigour  brown! 

Ye    Skies   no   longer    blue! 
Too  much  I  feel  from  Delia's  Frown, 

To  bear  these  Frowns  from  you. 

Where  is  y^  Spring's  delightfull  green? 

The    Summer's    ample    Bow'r? 
And  where  my  Delia's  wonted  Mien, 

That  brighten'd  ev'ry  Flow'r? 

Where'er  my  lovesick  Limbs  I  lay, 
To  shun  the  rushing  wind. 

It's  busy  murmur  seems  to  say. 
She  never  will  be  kind. 

The  Naiads,  o'er  their  frozen  Urns, 

In  icy  chains  repine; 
And  each,  in  sullen  silence,  mourns 

Her  Freedom  lost — Uke  mine. 

No  more  the  warbUng  Birds  rejoice; 

Of  all  that  chear'd  y'  Plain, 
Echo  alone  retains  her  Voice, 

And  She — repeats  my  Pain! 

Soon  will  the  Sun's  returning  Rays 
The    chearless    Frost    controul; 

When   will   relenting   DeUa   chase 
The  Winter  of  my  soul! 


80  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Queen  Elizabeth,  a  Ballad. 
The  tune,  "  Come  &  listen  to  my  Ditty. " 
Inscribed,  To  the  R'  Hon^?'  Lady  Hertford 
now  Dutchess  of   Somerset. 

Will  you  hear  how  once  repining 
Poor  Eliza  captive  lay? 

Each  ambitious  Thought  resigning, 
Foe   to  Riches,   Pomp,   &   Sway? 

While  the  Nymphs  &  Swains  dehghted 
Tript  around  in  rural  Pride, 

Envying  Joys,  by  others  shghted. 
Thus  the  royal  Maiden  cry'd. 

Bred  on  Plains,  or  born  in  Valleys, 

Who  would  bid  those  scenes  Adieu? 

Stranger  to  the  Arts  of  Malice 

Who  wou'd  ever  Courts  pursue? 

Censure,  never  taught  to  treasure, 
Censure  never  taught  to  bear. 

Love  is  all  the  Shepherd's  Pleasure 
Love  is  all  the  Damsel's  Care. 

How  can  they  of  humble  Station 

Fondly  blame  the  Pow'rs  above? 

How,  accuse  the  Dispensation, 

Which  allows  them  all,  to  Love} 

Love  like  Air  is  freely  given; 

Pow'r  nor  Chance  can  these  restrain; 
Common  Gifts  of  bounteous  Heaven, 

Only  purest  on  the  Plain! 

Courts  cou'd  ne'er  y^  Charms  discover, 
All  in  Stars  &  Garters  drest; 

As,  on  Sundays,  does  the  Lover, 
With  his  Posie  on  his  Breast. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  81 

Pinks  &  Roses  in  profusion! 

Said  to  fade  when  Cloe^s  near! 
Fops  might  use  the  same  Allusion, 

But  the  Shepherd  is  sincere. 

Collin's  utmost  Bliss  is  bounded, 

While  the  Crook  his  Hand  adorns; 

Better  That  with  Flow'rs  surrounded, 
Than  y®  Sceptre  rough  with  Thorns. 

Better  far  the  rushy  Bonnet 

Than  a  Crown,  well  understood; 
While  perhaps  there  blushes  on  it 

Some  unhappy  Rival's  Blood! 

Hark  to  yonder  Milkmaid  singing 

Chearly  o'er  the  brimming  Pail! 
Cowslips  all  around  her  springing, 

shining 

Sweetly  paint  the  charming  Vale. 

Never  yet  did  courtly  Maiden 

Look  so  sprightly,  look  so  fair; 
Or  her  Breast,  with  Jewells  laden. 

Pour  a  Song  so  void  of  Care. 


^o 


Wou'd  indulgent  Heav'n  had  granted 
Me,  some  rural  Damsel's  Part! 

All  the  Empire  I  had  wanted 

Then  had  been  my  Shepherd's  Heart. 

Then,  with  Him,  o'er  Hills  &  Mountains, 
Free  from  Censure,  might  I  rove; 

Fearless  taste  the  crystal  Fountains, 
Peacefull  sleep  beneathe  y^  Grove. 

Ever  gentle,  still  forgiving. 

Partial  to  my  virgin  Bloom, 
None  had  censur'd  me,  when  living; 

None  had  flatter 'd,  on  my  Tomb. 


82  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

To  some  Village  they  had  bore  me, 
Wept  by  Lover's  tears  alone; 

Strephon  hung  y^  Garland  oer  me, 
Strephon  had  inscrib'd  y®  Stone. 


Poems  from  the  Manuscript  that  Vary  Greatly  from  Their 

Published  Forms 


The  Shepherd's  Garland, 
consisting  of  Four  new  Ballads  in  y^  Pastoral 
Style  written  after  Leaving  Chelt'nam  MDCCXLIII 
&  sacred  To  the  Youth,  Beauty,  &  Manner  of   . 
Simplici  Myrto  nihil  allabores 
Sedulus  euro.  HOR. 

[Then  follows  Absence.] 


Hope 

Hie  gehdi  Pontes,  hie  molha  Prata,  Lycori; 
Hie  Nemus,  hie  toto  tecum  consumerer  Ovo. 

My  Banks  they  are  furnish'd  w*-^  Bees, 
Whose  murmur  invites  one  to  sleep; 

My  Grottos  are  shaded  with  Trees, 

And  my  Hills  are  white-over  w'^  Sheep. 

I  seldom  have  met  w'?'  a  Loss; 

Such  Health  do  my  Fountains  bestow! 
My  Fountains,  all  border'd  w*^  Moss, 

Where  the  Pinks  &  the  Violets  grow! 

I  have  found  out  a  Gift  for  my  Fair; 

I  have  found  where  y^  wood-pigeons,  breed; 
Yet  let  me  that  Plunder  forbear; 

She  will  say  'twas  a  barbarous  Deed. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  83 

For  he  ne'er  cou'd  be  true,  she  aver'd 

Who  cou'd  rob  a  poor  Bird  of  its  Young; 

And  I  lov'd  her  the  more  when  I  heard 

Such  Tenderness  fall  from  her  Tongue. 

I  have  heard  her  with  sweetness  unfold 

How  that  Pity  was  due  to  a  Dove! 
That  it  ever  attended  the  bold, 

And  She  call'd  it  "the  Sister  of  Love." 

But  her  Words  such  a  Pleasure  convey, 

So  much  I  her  Accents  adore. 
Whatever,  whatever  she  say, 

Methinks  I  shou'd  love  her  y^  more. 

One  wou'd  think  she  might  like  to  retire 
To  the  Grove  I  have  labour'd  to  rear; 

Not  a  Shrub  that  I  heard  her  admire. 
But  it  grows  &  it  flourishes  there. 

0  how  sudden  the  Sweet-briar  strove, 

And  the  Myrtle,  to  render  it  gay! 
The  willow,  so  hatefuU  to  Love. 
The  Willow  alone  is  away. 

Were  I  sure  that  Arabia  cou'd  boast 
A  Flow'r  or  a  Shrub,  to  her  Mind, 

1  wou'd  sail  to  y^  far  'distant  Coast, 

It's  favourite  Blossom  to  find. 

With  zeal  shou'd  thy  Lover  depart. 

And  meet  y^  rude  Seas  w.'    a  Smile; 
And  all  that  wou'd  go  to  my  Heart, 

Were  to  leave  my  dear  PJiillis  y^  while. 

The  Linnets  all  flock  to  my  Groves; 

Where 

The  Limes  their  rich  Fragrance  bestow; 
And  the  Nightingales  warble  their  Loves 
From  Thickets  of  Roses,  that  blow. 


84  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

And  when  her  bright  Form  shall  appear, 
Each  Bird  shall  harmoniously  join, 

In  a  concert,  so  sweet  &  so  clear, 

As  she  may  not  be  fond  to  resign. 

Not  a  Pine  in  my  Copse  is  there  seen, 

But  with  tendrils  of  Wood-bine  'tis  bound; 

Not  a  Linden's  more  beautiful  Green, 
But  a  Jessamin  twines  it  around. 

Dear  Regions  of  Silence  &  Shade! 

Soft  scenes  of  Contentment  &  Ease ! 
Where  /  cou'd  have  pleasingly  stray'd, 

If  ought,  in  her  Absence,  cou'd  please. 

But  where  does  my  Phillida  stray? 

And  where  are  her  Grotts  &  her  Bow'rs? 
Are  her  Groves  &  her  Valleys  as  gay? 

And  the  Shepherds  as  gentle,  as  ours? 

The  Groves  may  perhaps  be  as  fair, 

And  the  Face  of  the  Valleys  as  fine; 

The  Swain's  gentle  Manners  compare, 
But  their  Love  is  not  equal  to  Mine. 


SOLLICITUDE. 

— Tenui  pendentia  Filo 

Why  will  you  my  Passion  reprove? 

Why  term  it  a  Folly  to  grieve? 
E'er  I  shew  you  the  Charms  of  my  Love, 

She  is  fairer  y"  you  can  believe. 

With  her  Charms  she  enamours  y^  brave; 

With  her  Wit  she  engages  the  Free; 
With  her  Modesty  pleases  the  Grave; 

— She  is  ev^ry  way  pleasing  to  me. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  85 

I  can  see  how  she  charms  y^  rude  Hind; 

How  his  Gestures  are  alter'd  by  Love; 
My  Senses  are  false,  or  I  find 

Both  his  Voice  &  his  Language  improve. 

I  can  see  where  my  Charmer  goes  by, 
How  y » Hermit  peeps  out  of  his  Cell; 

How  he  thinks  of  his  Youth  w'    a  Sigh, 
How  fondly  he  wishes  her  well. 

Come  hither,  ye  Youths  of  the  Plain! 

Why  sUght  ye  my  amorous  Lays? 
I  cou'd  lay  down  my  Life  for  y^  Swain, 

That  will  speak  in  my  Phylhs's  Praise. 

When  He  sings,  may  y^  Nymphs  of  y^  town 

Come  flocking  &  hsten  y^  while; 
Nay  on  Him  let  not  PhiUida  frown — 

But  I  cannot  allow  her  to  smile. 

For  when  Paridel  tries,  in  y^  Dance, 

Any  Favour  with  Phyllis  to  find, 
0  then,  with  one  trivial  Glance, 

She  might  ruin  y^  Peace  of  my  Mind ! 

For  Paridel  artfully  tells 

A  soothing  fantastical  Tale; 
And  shews  her  wherein  she  excells 

The  Lilly,  that  graces  the  Vale. 

Away  to  the  Garden  he  hies, 

And  pillages  every  sweet; 
And,  tracing  their  several  Dyes, 

He  lays  them  at  Phyllis's  Feet. 

0  Phyllis,  he  whispers,  more  fair, 

More  sweet  than  y"?  Orange  in  Flow'r! 

Can  the  Pink  in  a  Morning  compare? 
Or  y^  Tuberose  after  a  Show'r? 


86  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

I  steal  from  no  Flow'rets  y*^  blow- 
To  paint  forth  her  Pow'r,  I  approve; 

For  what  can  a  Blossom  bestow 
So  dear  so  dehghtfull  as  Love? 

I  sing  in  a  rustical  Way ; 

A  Shepherd,  &  one  of  the  Throng; 
But  Phyllis  is  pleas'd  w'?^  my  Lay, 

Go,  Poets!  &  envy  my  Song. 

W.  G.t 

Fable 

Tis  y*^  same  Cupid  wakes  y^  Lyre 

That  deals  his  amorous  Darts  around; 

From  Love  we  catch  poetick  Fire, 

And  Echo  learns  her  sweetest  sound. 

As  Cupid  near  y^  Muses'  Glade 

In  slumber's  soft  embraces  lay, 

A  petulant  exulting  Maid 

Approaching,  stole  his  Darts  away. 

Henceforth,  she  said,  depriv'd  of  Pow'r 
Let  Cupids  Insolence  decrease; 

And,  from  this  blest,  this  happy  Hour, 
Let  us,  poor  Maidens!  live  in  Peace, 

Sleep  on,  poor  Child!  whilst  I  withdraw, 
And  this  thy  vile  Artill'ry  hide; 

At  length  y^  Muse's  Fount  she  saw. 

And  plung'd  'em  in  y^  crystal  Tide — 

But  will  those  streams,  so  lovely  clear. 

Escape  y^  Whipster  searching  round? 
Will  not  y^  glitt'ring  Points  appear? 
Will  not  y^  furtive  spoil  be  found? 

S. 
t  This  signature  is  puzzling. 


WILLIAM  SHENSHONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  87 

Too  soon  it  was;  &  ev'ry  Dart, 

Ting'd  in  y^  Muse's  lucid  spring, 
Acquir'd  new  Pow'r  to  touch  y"?  Heart 

And  taught,  at  once,  to  love  &  sing. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS  OF  THE  MANUSCRIPT 

Poems 
Written  on  my  Study-window. 

Published,  The  Scholar's  Relapse. 
Daphne's  Visit. 
The  Rose-bud. 
The  Lark. 

Published,  The  Sky-lark. 
The  Landskip. 
To  The  Hon.  Mrs.  Knight,  at  the  time  she  erected  her  Library. 

PubHshed,  To  a  Lady  of  QuaHty  iitting  up  her  Library,  1738. 
Song. 
Ode. 

Published,  Ode  to  a  Young  Lady  somewhat  too  solicitous  about  her  man- 
ner of  expression. 
Imitated  from  Boileau,  "Voici  les  lieux,  etc." 

Published,  Imitated  from  the  French. 
In  Winter,  1746. 

To  Miss  .  .  .  not  dancing  at  a  Ball. 
Alluding  to  a  Rural  Custom  on  Valentine's  Day. 

Published,  Valentine's  Day. 
Urit  spes  animi  credula  mutui. 

PubUshed,  Ode.     Written  1739. 

Urit  spes  animi  credula  mutui.    Hor. 
For  Valentine's  Day. 
For  a  Beech. 
The  King-fisher. 

PubUshed,  The  Halcyon. 
Sonnet. 
Song. 

To  the  Honourable  Mrs.  Knight,  at  the  time  she  was  laying  out  her  Villa. 
The  Sanctuary. 
Queen  Elizabeth,  a  Ballad. 

Published,  The  Princess  Elizabeth. 
The  Author  Indisposed. 

Published,   Song  V. 
Verses  left  at  The  Right  Honorable  the  Lady  Luxborough's. 

Winter,   1747. 

Published,  Upon  a  visit  to  the  same  in  Winter  1748. 
Here  Luxborough  sat. 
On  a  Lady's  refusing  to  be  seen  the  day  before  she  was  to  leave  a  Public  Place. 


89  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Published,  Song  X,  1743. 
James  Dawson's  Garland. 

Published,  Jemmy  Dawson. 
The  Roses  Reconciled. 
Mr.  Shenstone  to  Mr.  Whistler. 
The   Evergreen. 
A  BaUad. 

Published,  Nancy  of  the  Vale. 
Inscription  for  a  medicinal  fountain  in  my  Farm. 
On  the  Discovery  of  the  Chelt'nam  Waters  by  Pigeons. 
The  Kid. 

Pubhshed,  The  Dying  Kid. 
An  Inscription  in  the  Old  English  Guise  and  Characters  and  Spelling;  to  be 

found  in  my  Gothic  Building. 

Published  in  Dodsley's  Description  of  the  Leasowes  {Works,  II). 
An  Inscription  in  my  Grove;  or  Fairy-Spell. 

Published  in  Dodsley's  Description  of  the  Leasowes. 
Adieu!  ye  jovial  youths. 

Published,  Song  XVII.     Written  in  a  Collection  of  Bacchanalian  Songs. 
Lysander  to  Chloe. 
Sonnet. 

Published,  Song  III. 
The  Shepherd's  Garland. 

Pubhshed,  A  Pastoral  Ballad. 
Ode. 
Fable. 

Published,  Anacreontic,  1738. 
The  Amorous  Inconstant. 
Song. 

Ode  to  Memory. 
Written  in  Autumn,  1748. 

Published,  Verses  written  towards  the  close  of  the  year  1748,  to  William 
Lyttleton,   Esq. 
Verses  on  a  Seat  in  my  Grove. 

Pubhshed  in  Dodsley's  Description  of  the  Leasowes. 
Then  take  a  nymph. 

Latin  Inscriptions 
In  Memoriam  FHrtilla. 
To  Eutrecia  Smith. 

Published,  To  Maria  Dolman. 
To  James  Thomson. 
O  Viator! 
To  M.  A. 
On  a  Mausoleum. 

Illustrations 
Seventeen  paintings,  of  which  seven  are  full-page  landscapes. 
Two  pencil  sketches. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 
Aiken,  Dr.  E. 

Life  of  Shenstone.     In  Select  Works  of  the  British  Poets.     Phihidelphia. 

Thomas   Wardle.     1831. 
Anderson,   Robert. 

Life   of   Shenstone.     In   Poets   of   Great   Britain.     London.     John   and 

Arthur  Arch.     1794. 
Bacon,   Francis. 

Essays.     Edited    by    Reynolds.     Clarendon    Press.     Oxford.     1890. 
Beers,  Henry  A. 

A  History  of  English  Romanticism  in  the  Eighteenth  Century.     Henry 

Holt  and  Co.     New  York.     1910. 
Black,  Adam  and  Charles. 

Guide  to  England  and  Wales.     Edinburgh.     1869. 
Boswell,  James. 

Life  of   Samuel  Johnson.     Edited  by  George  Birkbeck  Hill.     Clarendon 

Press.     Oxford.     1887. 
Browning,   Elizabeth  Barrett. 

Poetical  Works.     Troy,  N.  Y.     Nims  and  Knight.     1887. 
Brydges,  Sir  Egerton,  Bart. 

Life  of  Milton.     In  Poetical  Works  of  Milton,  edited  by  Brydges.     Phila- 
delphia.    George  S.  Appleton.     1851. 
Burns,  Robert. 

Works.     Edited   by   Allen    Cunningham.    London.     Cochrane   and 

M'  Crone.     1834. 
Carlyle,  Alexander. 

Autobiography.     Edinburgh.     Blackwood  and  Sons.     1860. 
Chalmers,   Alexander. 

English  Poets  from  Chaucer  to  Cowper.     London.     J.  Johnson.     1810. 
Cowper,  William. 

Private  Correspondence.     Edited  by  Rev.  T.   S.   Grimshawe.     London. 

Saunders  and  Otley.     1836. 
Daniel,   Otto. 

William  Shenstone's  Schoolmistress  und  das  Aufkommen  des  Kleinepos  in 

der  neuenglischen  Litteratur.     Inaugural-dissertation  zur  Erlangung  der 

Doktorwiirde.     Weimar.     1908. 
Dictionary    of    National    Biography.     Edited   by   Leslie    Stephen.     London. 

Smith,  Elder,  and  Co.     1885. 
D'Israeli,  Isaac. 

Curiosities  of  Literature.     London.     Edward  Moxon.     1849. 
D'Israeli,   Isaac. 

Curiosities  of  Literature.     London.     G.   Routledge  and  Co.     1858. 


WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS  91 

Dodsley,  Robert. 

A   Collection  of  Poems  by   Several  Hands.     London.     Dodsley.     1765. 

Enaerson,  Ralph  Waldo. 

Works,  Centenary  Edition,  I.     Boston.     Houghton,  Mifflin,  and  Co.  1903. 
Gentleman's  Magazine  LXV,  LXVH,  LXXX,  LXXHT.  London.     1795,  1817. 

Goldsmith,  Oliver. 

Works,  II,  IV.     London,  Allan  Bell  and  Co.     1835. 

Graves,  Richard. 

Columella.     London.     J.  Dodsley.     1779. 

Euphrosyne;  or,  Amusements  on  the  Road  of  Life.     London.     J.  Dodsley. 

1776. 

Recollections  of  Some  Particulars  in  the  Life  of  the  late  William  Shen- 
stone,  Esq.  In  a  series  of  letters  from  an  intimate  friend  of  his  to  [William 
Seward,  Esq.].     London.     J.  Dodsley.     1788. 

Mr.  Hutton  of  Oxford  wrote  in  his  Burford  Papers  in  1905  that  this 

book  by  Graves  was  rare.     I  tried  several  of  the  largest  Ubraries  in  this 

country  and  could  not  find  it.     A  letter  from  one  of  the  officials  of  the 

New  York  Public  Library  stated,  however,  that  they  had  on  their  shelves 

"Seward,  William,  Recollections  of  some  particulars  in  the  Ufe  of 

Wm.    Shenstone   in   a   series   of   letters  .  .  .   [anon].     London,    1788. 

12  mo." 

By  personal  investigation  I  found  that  this  was  the  volume  I  desired. 
The  name  of  the  author  does  not  appear  on  the  title-page.  Some  hand 
had  inserted,  with  pen  and  ink,  the  name  of  Seward  as  the  person  to  whom 
the  letters  were  written,  and  the  book  was  catalogued  as  by  him.  It  is 
plainly  the  book  by  Graves,  as  is  shown  by  paragraphs  in  it,  which  Ander- 
son quotes  at  length  as  by  Graves,  and  by  the  statement  of  the  author  on 
page  133,  made  in  connection  with  Shenstone's  letters,  that  his  accounts 
of  the  people  of  rank  who  visited  him  were  written  only  to  two  of  his  most 
intimate  friends — "either  to  me  or  to  Mr.  Jago."  Now  nearly  all  the 
letters  in  the  only  volume  of  them  published  at  that  time  were  either  to 
Mr.  Graves  or  to  Mr.  Jago.  My  information  on  this  point  was  welcomed 
by  the  New  York  librarian,  and  the  book  is  now  probably  catalogued 
correctly. 

Gray,  Thomas, 

Letters,  with  Biographical  Notice.  Edited  by  Henry  M.  Rideout.  Bos- 
ton.    Sherman  French  and  Co.     1907. 

Poems,  to  which  are  prefixed  Memoirs  of  his  Life  and  Writings  by  W. 
Mason.     Printed  by  A.  Ward;  and  sold  by  J.  Dodsley.    London.     1775. 
Works.     Edited  by  Edmund  Gosse.      New  York.     Armstrong   and  Son. 
1885. 
Works.     Edited    by    John    Mitford.     London.     Mawman.     1816. 

Herald  and  Genealogist,  VI.    Edited  by  John  G.  Nichols.     London.     Nichols. 
1871. 


92  WILLIAM  SHENSTONE  AND  HIS  CRITICS 

Hulme,  William  H. 

Thomas   Percy   and   William   Shenstone.     In   Modern   Language  Notes, 

XXVII. 
Hutton,  William  Holden. 

Burford    Papers.     London.     Archibald    Constable    and    Co.     1905. 
Jago,  Richard. 

Edgehill.     In  Poets  of  Great  Britain,  edited  by  Anderson.    XI. 
Johnson,  Samuel. 

Life  of  Shenstone.     In  Works,  edited  by  George  Birkbeck  Hill.    Oxford. 

Clarendon  Press.     1905. 
Lady  Luxborough. 

Letters  written  to  William  Shenstone,  Esq.     Edited  by  John  Hodgetts. 

London.     J.   Dodsley.     1775. 
Lowell,  James  Russell. 

Letters.     Edited  by  C.  E.  Norton.     New  York.     Harper  and  Brothers. 

1894. 
Mason,  William. 

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